The Number of the ED
by Belashkal
Summary: Inspired from the old boardgame, Battle for Armageddon, this fiction came to my mind... Doesn't contain the original Eds Space Outlaw spinoff. Rerated M for expclicit violence and drug usage. Also, some adult issues dealt with.
1. Surprise in the Enemy's hand!

The Number of the ED - part 1

The Number of the ED 

_"Woe to you, Oh Earth and Sea, for the Devil sends the Beast   
with wrath, because he knows the time is short...   
Let him who hath understanding reckon the number of the Beast  
for it is a human number, its number is six hundred and sixty six."  
_**--Book of Revelations Ch. XIII v. 18**

Charleston carefully closed the door as he got home to McKenzie. The psyker had very good hearing, and Charleston could bet he didn't want it damaged further. Battles were noisy, that Charleston knew very well. Furthermore, there was an old lady upstairs to McKenzie's apartment, and she used to bang a broomstick in the floor when they got too noisy, especially when McKenzie played his Iron Maiden records. Charleston liked some of the Iron's music, but he preferred Zeppelin.   
"G'day Ed." McKenzie said as Charleston poked his head into McKenzie's kitchen. "Knew you were coming."   
"You always do. So, why'd ya call?" Charleston asked.   
"I thought we could go down to the pub, take a glass or two. Talk memories."   
Charleston thought on this for a moment and then answered:   
"Okay, but'll Eddie come?"   
"No, he said he was busy with something, didn't state what."   
McKenzie was obviously picking out dishes from the dishwasher. Charleston knew he was the butterfingers concerning kitchenware, so he told McKenzie he would wait for him at the door. 

Fifteen minutes later, the two were sitting in the pub on St. John's Street, having their first beer. Charleston watched as McKenzie fooled yet another man with his coin trick. Charleston smiled to himself. He knew McKenzie never brought money to pay his drinks with, but he always seemed to have it when he had to pay. It was witchery, Charleston knew it, but he also knew that daemons weren't here, so McKenzie was safe from their malignant influence.   
"So Ed," McKenzie said, turning to him. "What are you thinking about?"   
"You tell me." Charleston replied.   
McKenzie looked puzzled and uttered a quiet "oh" and looked concentrated for a moment. He looked up after a few seconds and turned to Charleston.   
"You're thinking about the Yarricks, right?" McKenzie asked.   
"Righto. More precisely about Seb."   
"Sebastian?" McKenzie said and scratched his chin. He came to think that he should've shaved before he'd gone down to the pub, but he didn't care so much. "He was a hero. Talk about a legend reborn..."   
"I thought Rolf was the legend reborn?" Charleston said, confused.   
"Oh, he was, but he was also half-breed, Sebastian wasn't."   
"I still recall the day Seb graduated from the Commissariat, when he'd earned his Ordo Imperialis and Commissarial Badge. What a day. I still recall it clearly."   
"I still recall his answer to your question if he remembered you."   
Charleston looked shocked and turned to McKenzie.   
"He wasn't more than a baby when he met me the first time, on Armageddon. I thought he wouldn't remember me!"   
"Well he did. To quote: 'Of course I remember you, Charleston! Such a stink as that of your feet, Lieutenant, can only be forgotten with therapy!'. I laugh at it still!"   
Charleston got a sour face as McKenzie laughed out loud at this. Other people in the pub wondered what was happening at the counter. When they saw the two huge men, they decided not to pay too much attention to it. They had after all come on motorcycles, big ones. And the smaller, lankier fella had an orange tattoo on his left temple.  
McKenzie suddenly stopped laughing, a streak of concern going across his face. He looked directly at Charleston, and this made the giant man reel away a bit.   
"Ed, you've never told me what happened when you and Sebastian were left alone to fight both Orks and Berzerkers on Armageddon. Why haven't you?"   
"Because it was the worst war ever. Sebastian had nightmares from that year on, every night! I'd rather not talk about it."   
"Ed, please, I want to know. Either you tell me, or I'll probe you for the information."   
Charleston's eyes turned hard to McKenzie at this.   
"Y'know I hate it when you do so!"   
"Then tell me"   
Charleston sighed and began:   
"It all began about ten, maybe twelve, years before the Siege. My 8th Company had been stationed on Armageddon for roughly a hundred years, or as long as the von Strab's had held the power as Governors of Armageddon. Seb was stationed there on one last mission before his retirement, to reform one of the Armageddon Steel Legions. It all began that fateful day known as the day of the Feast of the Emperor's Ascension..." 

Armageddon, 12 years before the Siege and Fall of the Imperium of Mankind, day of the Feast   
Sebastian Yarrick was woken by a wet nose that puffed him in his face. He opened one eye and looked at his dog, Cerberus. Sebastian'd had Cerberus since the day he'd graduated as Commissar. He'd gotten him as a pup, and that was nearly forty five years ago. Cerberus was a wolfhound, native to Callidus and from a race renowned for it longevity.   
Sebastian opened his other eye and sat up in his bed. He stretched out to his full one metre seventy before he scratched his old friend behind his ear.   
"This is the Day, right Cerberus?" Sebastian said as Cerberus tried to lick him as thanks.   
He got up and got dressed in his finest dress uniform. This was a great day for celebrating, and that meant suave clothing. Seb dressed himself in the black highwaisted dress breeches and dress jacket of the Commissariat, tied his Ordo Imperialis around his waist and went into the bathroom to shave and fix his hair somewhat. Sebastian had earned his grandfather's genes concerning his hair, and he had to cut it every six weeks or so. He always cut it in a buzz-cut, much like Charleston's, but a little longer, but his hair, which was steel-grey for the record, seemed to want to grow into a hairstyle that made him look as his grandfather. Sebastian hated it. Unlike his grandfather, Seb had turned an old man just a few years ago. He'd noticed it one morning when his legs didn't want to get out of bed. Charleston had joked about it and said Seb had just gotten into the metal-age, the age when one has gold in the teeth, silver in the hair and lead in the legs. He was right, Sebastian thought, on two points at least. Sebastian had all his teeth left, as a matter of fact, and he was proud of it.   
When he was in the middle of his thoughts and shaving, Cerberus came in, holding his food-bowl in his mouth. Sebastian looked down on him and said he would come in a moment. As Cerberus went out, someone came into his apartment, a place lying high up into the Spire of Infernus Hive.   
"Good morning, Lieutenant Commander!" Sebastian said as he finished the tricky part under the chin.   
"Morning Seb!" Charleston echoed. "I'll feed Cerberus for ya!"   
Sebastian hummed an answer and washed his face clean of the shaving ladder. He was a commissar, with a good monthly income, but an electrical shaver was quite expensive. They weren't STC'd as Chimeras or Leman Russ tanks.   
He went out of the bathroom and picked up the morning mail. For Sebastian, 'morning' was from 9.00 am to 12.00 am. The latter was usually when he got up. Armageddon was in times of peace now. The one letter that caught his eye was an invitation from no one else than the Planetary Governor himself; Herman von Strab. Sebastian hated the man for the simple fact that he was incompetent. His father, Luthor, had been much more intelligent. So had his brothers, but they were all dead. But, one couldn't deny an invitation from the Planetary Governor. Sebastian sighed as he thought of what he was going to miss by being stuck on a gala-dinner. He would miss going with Charleston to that Cathayan restaurant, he would miss the hours before the yearly meteorite rain, which always happened on the same time, every year. He would miss a bar fight or two...   
"Ed," Sebastian called as he walked into the kitchen, just in time to see Charleston drop a plate. It fell to the floor and went to a hundred pieces with a crash.   
"Sorry." Charleston said meekly.   
"Don't worry. What I wanted to say was that we're invited on a gala-dinner tonight."   
"At who's?" Charleston asked as he picked up the larger chunks of what once was a dish.   
"At von Strab's..." Sebastian didn't get any further.   
"No way! I know how he talks about me! He hates us Marines!" Charleston was so upset he almost dropped a new plate.   
"Ed, look, it's for this evening only, and I believe he knows of the meteorites, so we won't miss it!"   
"I don't care, he can go to Helsreach!" Charleston was very angry, at least of what Sebastian could tell.   
"It's pronounced 'Hell's reach" Ed, when will you learn?" Sebastian sighed. He went out in the entry room and pulled on his jackboots. He'd polished them shiny the night before, and was very proud of their looks. After that, Sebastian pulled on his leather gloves and put his commissar's cap on his head, back brim first. He turned to Charleston who was approaching him as he took down his greatcoat from its hook.   
"One night only, Ed." Sebastian repeated.   
"Oh, okay, but it's his fault if he asks insulting questions."   
"I'll be the judge of that." Sebastian replied and patted his thigh to call Cerberus to him. "Now, let's go find you a dress suit. Won't fit if you came in power armour, would it?" 

Later that evening   
"I feel stupid." Charleston said as he twisted a bit in his brand-new dress suit. "I look like a penguin!"   
"Get used to the tails Ed." Sebastian replied as they walked into the great hallway of the Infernus Opera. Sebastian had been here before, but he was just as awed this time as last time by the huge marble walls. It seemed everything was carved from one enormous rock. The galleries and boxes in the main hall could be transformed, so to speak, into a space capable to field the tables that were laid out for nearly one thousand guests. To finish it all off, a huge chandelier hung from the roof, shaped like the Imperial Eagle. Sebastian estimated it weighed somewhere around a tonne.   
As the two walked through the entry hall and entered the main hall, a voice snapped Sebastian from his thoughts:   
"Excuse me Mr...Yarrick, is it? You must leave your 'pet' here." the receptionist said with a gesture towards Cerberus. Sebastian had forgotten all about him.   
"Of course." Sebastian replied. "But be careful, he bites people he doesn't like."   
Sebastian smiled towards the now nervous receptionist and patted the man on his shoulder before he went on.   
Charleston looked nervously around. He was definitely not used to wear a dress suit instead of a suit of powered armour. He seemed to be looking for something. 'Probably the exit' Sebastian thought to himself.   
"Ed, calm down. This isn't so bad and in merely an hour we'll be watching the meteorites, as we usually do." he tried. It didn't seem to work.   
"I feel so out of place. Look at me! Look at them! I'm two and a half metres high and nearly all muscle, but they're thin and aristocratic!"   
The commissar did not take notice so much of Charleston's comment on how they looked, he got more attached to the cats in the ladies' arms.   
"Gyrinxes!" Sebastian spat. "I have to leave my dog outside, but they can bring in their Gyrinxes! Well ain't that the worst! Cerberus has higher intelligence than those felines! At least he's less malignant."   
"Has this something to do with the Gyrinx that scratched you bad when you were three years old?" Charleston said and scratched his chin. "Of course it has Ed!" Seb replied. "And the worst is that Herman adores them, we're not equal on one..."   
Charleston gave Sebastian a hard elbow as to warn that someone was approaching them. That someone happened to be Herman von Strab. Of course carrying his own Gyrinx, the chalk-white Sela. It had been in the von Strab family for many years, longer than Sebastian had been around and it had been that Gyrinx which scratched him. There was no love lost between Sebastian and Sela. None at all.   
"Good evening gentlemen." von Strab said in his most pleasurable tone. Sebastian thought it sounded so fake he could be sick. Charleston felt the same. Herman von Strab was a man in his thirties, his head shaved bald and wearing a monocle over his left eye. He was around one metre ninety and quite powerfully built.   
"Good evening, governor." Sebastian managed to get out, his eyes fixed on Sela. The Gyrinx purred softly, but it kept a steady eye on the old commissar. Charleston muttered forth an " 'Evening." and then decided it was time to visit the punch bowl.   
"Good," von Strab began. "Now that the Marine is gone, I can talk with you Yarrick, one-on-one."   
"Of course." Sebastian replied and in a sweeping chesture grabbed a champagne glass from a passing waiter's silver plate. von Strab was just startled over how swiftly the old man moved. He'd read about Sebastian's grandfather, the famous, and now legendary, Commissar-General Rolf 'The Wolf' Yarrick. von Strab had, how much he even hated to admit it, the Yarrick family to thank that his family now was in control of Armageddon. It could have been the other way around, Herman knew it.   
"What is it about?" Sebastian asked after a moment's silence.   
"As you know, you've been my tactical advisor the last ten years, but as you're going to retire, I'm wondering, who will replace you?"   
Sebastian was taken aback by the question. He hadn't told Charleston yet that he had thought on retiring, but somehow, von Strab had managed to find out.   
"I don't know," Sebastian replied while playing with the thought of what he would to do to the man that had told von Strab he was going to retire, when he found him. "You'll have to ask Commissar Holt about that. He's in command of the Commissariat of Armageddon."   
With that, Sebastian left von Strab to his thoughts. It was rude to leave a planetary governor just like that, but a commissar served the Emperor first and no-one second. Most people with sense knew this.   
Sebastian tapped Charleston on his arm as he joined him. Charleston spun round and then looked down to get into eye contact with the old man.   
"Ed, there's something I have to tell you." Sebastian said, his voice sounding troubled.   
"What?" Charleston simply replied and handed Sebastian what looked like cheese and shrimp on a stick. Gourmet food wasn't in Seb's taste, but this was the day of the Feast, wasn't it?   
"I'm going to retire."   
Charleston nearly dropped the very expensive Cathayan mica glass in his hand. The glasses were made of the sand on the Cathayan seafloor, which was a good 10 miles below surface level and gave the glass a reddish-purple colour.   
"You must be kidding!" Charleston yelped.   
"Ed, I'm no Space Marine, I'm an old man now. My body has begun telling me it's had enough!" Sebastian played a bit with the stick from the snack between his left-hand fingers, placed it in between the thumb and the middle finger and broke it with the index finger. He looked up at Charleston.   
"It's life, my friend, heroes come, and heroes fall. I'm seventy years old, and I would appreciate to celebrate my seventy first birthday."   
"Sebastian Yarrick, is it really you?" a voice called from behind them.   
Sebastian and Charleston spun round and a smile broke Seb's face.   
"Ishmael Grisham! What are you doing here?" Sebastian said as he hugged his old friend in a brotherly embrace.   
"I live here nowadays. Retired ten years ago. Had no idea you were here. How long have you been here Seb?" Ishmael asked. Ishmael was just like Sebastian seventy years old, but his hair was chalk-white. He was just as slimly built as Seb, but nearly ten centimetres taller.   
"For thirty years at least." Sebastian said as the threesome walked away from the crowd of people. "I was stationed here after twenty years of service between different regiments. I've grown quite fond of Armageddon, despite its name!"   
The other two laughed heartily at this. Sebastian had, despite his childhood, a great sense of humour. Charleston believed it was because his childhood, Sebastian had that humour.   
"So, Ishmael, where have you been? We lost communication shortly after graduation." Sebastian asked after a while.   
"I was stationed in the Border Planets systems. There had been reports of one planet being heavily infested with Orks."   
"Orks?" Charleston asked, "What are those?"   
"They're big and green, Ed, extremely savage, could tell you more, but it would take ages." Sebastian suddenly remembered he hadn't introduced Charleston to Ishmael. How rude of him!   
"I forgot, Ishmael, let me introduce you to Lieutenant Commander Edmund Charleston, 8th Company Death Angels. Ed, let me introduce you to ex-commissar Ishmael "IG" Grisham."   
"IG?" Charleston asked as he shook Ishmael's hand.   
"I hated my name when I was young, IG are my initials."   
"So, Ishmael, what happened there?" Sebastian queried.   
"The Orks put up some damn hard resistance. We fought for years. Thought that every new day was going to be my last. Nearly was ten years ago. We'd been fighting for two years on Gideon when it happened." Ishmael made a pause to rub his back as the war-wound that had made him retire reminded itself again. "The Orks fought like if possessed, and they were quite well organized. Haven't seen them so organized, with the exception of..."   
"Gazgrim Nekksnappa, I know." Sebastian interrupted. "I made a study of them. I know their language and culture quite well, thank you Ishmael."   
"Right," Ishmael said as he continued. "These were even more organized, like the Hive Fleets. The force I was in was attacked from behind, and what I saw before I was knocked into a coma, was the most fekking large Ork I've ever seen, must have been at least 3 and a half to four metres tall. Without the mega armour it was wearing."   
"Mega armour?" Charleston interrupted.   
"Almost like Imperial Tactical Dreadnought armour, but less efficient, and more cumbersome." Sebastian explained.   
"Yeah, but this Ork was the size of a Dreadnought walker! He didn't even bother to use the power claw of his on me. He merely smacked me in the back, breaking it. That's what made me retire and come to Armageddon. I was in coma for four weeks. The medics said it was risk for me breaking it again, so I retired. Believe me, they said it was only a few centimetres from making me lame from chest and down."   
"Not good." Sebastian mumbled as he knocked back the last of his champagne.   
Ishmael "hmm"ed an answer and started fidgeting with his left hand. Sebastian saw immediately that something was wrong with his friend.   
"IG, what is it?" he asked. Sebastian grabbed his friend in his left arm, but snapped his hand back. With force, Sebastian rolled up Ishmael's sleeve. What he saw was the titanium skeleton of a bionic arm. He looked shocked at Ishmael.   
"What...how...?" Sebastian stuttered forth.   
"The giant Ork left me for dead, trampled my arm." was Ishmael's simple answer. He looked with sorrow eyes on Sebastian. Sebastian answered with the same look. They both had told each other to try to avoid bionic implants. Ishmael had broken that promise.   
"I didn't notice because you were wearing gloves." Sebastian said after a long moment's silence.   
"Something bugs me about that Ork Warlord though." Ishmael said as he pulled down his sleeve again. "On his claw was a glyph I've never seen before. Never. If I didn't know better, I would say he had his own, personal glyph."   
"Impossible." Sebastian protested. None of them were paying attention to Charleston now. He just watched the conversation. "All Ork Warlords and Warbosses create their names from existing glyphs! There has been no record of personal glyphs before."   
"Well, "expert"?" Ishmael said a bit irritated. "I still remember it clearly, I can draw it up for you. Then you tell me what it is!"   
"Fine!" Sebastian said and crossed his arms over his chest. He and Ishmael often had conversations like this, but they were the best of friends.   
Ishmael pulled out a pad and a pen from a pocket and drew down the Ork glyph.   
"I'm writing my biography, if you wonder Seb." Ishmael said as he put the finishing touches to the glyph. "That's why I always wear a pen and pad nowadays." He handed the pad to Sebastian, who studied it intently for a couple of minutes.   
"Never seen it before, but the iron gob and the horns give him away for being a mighty Warlord, but as for the one-eyed skull, I don't know." Sebastian said as he looked up from the pad.   
"Half the Ork's cranium seemed to be made of metal, of what I saw the split second before he hit me." Ishmael added. "Maybe that explains the one-eyed skull."   
Charleston took a look at the glyph. He remembered something with it. He'd seen it before, but where?   
"I've seen it before, on a crippled Space Hulk. We thought it was Genestealer infected, but it seemed as if used by something else and then abandoned." he said as he turned to the two elderly men.   
"How long ago was that, Ed?" Sebastian asked concerned.   
"Couple of months ago maybe, can't remember clearly." Charleston said as he scratched his chin in thought. "But it was in an abandoned star system, far from any planet, so I don't know what happened to them."   
"What did you do then?" Ishmael asked.   
"Reported it to the Magos Xenos, and it was identified as Space Hulk 6-6-5." Charleston replied.   
"6-6-5?" Ishmael repeated silently. "That was the hulk that left Gideon, the planet that they'd invaded. It just disappeared!"   
"And Ed found it." Sebastian said as he thought of something. Something wasn't right here. Throwing an eye on his watch, he saw it was approaching mid-night.   
"Yoinks!" he exclaimed as he saw the time. "We'd better get outside, Armageddon soon passes through the Belt."   
Ishmael and Sebastian went outside, followed closely by Charleston. Although in a Hive, they were so far up that the night-sky was clearly visible. There wasn't a cloud on the star-strewn sky and Charleston inhaled the air as if it was the real. Armageddon's atmosphere was since long destroyed by all the industry, but the filter in the Upper Levels still kept the cool in the outside air but wasted the toxins. He looked towards the east and saw the pyre rising from the Diablo Mountains. Beyond the Diablo Mountains lay Hades Hive, on the other side of the Euminedes River.   
It wouldn't have been visible at ground level, but here, ten miles up in the air; one saw the black silhouette of the Hive where Sebastian had been raised. Charleston remembered the day he'd visited Rolf and his dead son's wife. Sebastian was cute, Charleston had thought. He'd born clear Yarrickian signs, like the blueish hair and the green eyes. Not to mention the slim build. But the accent from Callidus was lost as he was much with neighbours on Armageddon. He still had his grandfather's way of exclaiming things, but he lacked the accent. Charleston had thought it had sounded silly in the beginning, but now he liked it. Sebastian always had something to throw against possible verbal opponents. Anything ranging from an insult to a mere sarcasm. Sebastian had many times ended in trouble in the Schola Progenium because of his gift of the gab. At least that was what McKenzie had told him.   
Charleston joined Sebastian who now was alone. Ishmael had gone to talk with some of the Armageddon nobles. He got along much better than Sebastian, a much more political commissar than Sebastian. Seb was more the lead-by-example type of commissar, Charleston knew so. He and Sebastian were standing by a marble rail, wonderfully sculptured by the best sculptor that Armageddon had to offer. Their eyes were focused at the horizon to the south. Suddenly, a blue-white streak crossed the sky, the Belt Passing had begun.   
In the minutes that followed, all eyes were focused on the night-sky, as meteorite after meteorite crashed and burned in Armageddon's atmosphere. Some were of the larger kind and would probably hit the ground somewhere, most likely in the wasteland. Suddenly, Sebastian pointed towards something that seemed like, not a meteorite, but an asteroid.   
"Check out the size of that thing!" the old man gasped.   
Charleston saw the big rock as it came streaking towards Infernus Hive. It passed a mere kilometre above the highest spine, the roar of it's burning hulk almost deafening. Charleston guessed it'd been at least a few kilometres long and half as wide. But something with the huge rock troubled him. He wasn't alone on that point. He felt as Sebastian tugged his arm, like a small child calling an adult's attention. That was what Sebastian looked like in comparison with Charleston. A small child.   
"Ed, don't you think it's odd that thing hasn't been pulled in by Armageddon's gravity pool earlier?" Sebastian asked.   
"You too eh?" Charleston said and looked down on the small man.   
Something fell down before their noses and tinged as it landed on the marble floor. Sebastian, with his keen eyesight, saw where it landed and picked it up. He got a concerned look as he examined the little piece of metal. It looked like a cruel and flat hook. Sebastian tucked it into the pocket of his breeches and turned to Charleston.   
"Let's go inside. It's chilly and I don't want to catch a cold. Besides, I believe the dinner itself will begin soon." Sebastian told the Space Marine. He then turned and called over to Ishmael that they were going inside. Ishmael answered with a gesture that said they could go in before him, he'd join them sooner or later.   
"I think I'll go visit the punch-bowl again, before dinner." Charleston said with a smile.   
"I thought Marines weren't allowed to drink on duty?" Sebastian said with a shrewd look on his face.   
"McKenzie once told me a Marine body could take more than ten times as much alcohol as a normal human body. I intend to find out if that's true."   
"I see." Sebastian said and quickly added, "It's made from the Volcanus Hive Blanche Wine, right?"   
"Yeah, mixed with Volrathian Vodka and Callidussian Retango fruit juice." Charleston answered with a big smile and rushed off.   
As Sebastian was left alone, he shook his head silently to himself. Charleston was the perfect soldier, if it had not been for his somewhat cliffhanger like tactics. And his slow-to-get ways. But in the end, Charleston, IG and Cerberus were the best friends Sebastian ever had.   
"Well, if it ain't the reckless old man?" a voice suddenly said from behind. Sebastian knew the voice.   
"You still blame me for that thing, Hans Grauberger. They were up against bad odds." Sebastian said, as he turned on the two metres tall merchant noble. Grauberger was built like an ox, and had good contacts with noble houses as well as Underhive Gangsters. Sebastian had gotten on the way wrong side with Grauberger just a few months ago, when Charleston was gone on his mission in the abandoned star system.   
"It was six of my finest bodyguards against you, a decrepit old man, and his pooch." Grauberger said and grabbed Sebastian by his collar.   
"Watch the uniform, I'll use it when reviewing the troops next week." Sebastian said, trying to calm his rage against Grauberger. How Sebastian hated to be called decrepit old man. He wasn't one.   
"One of them is still in coma! And by the way, we're a bit off from the rest of the crowd, so you're free to scream. I want the others to hear what happens to my enemies." Grauberger spat and came close to Seb's lean face with his own pasty features. Sebastian winced slightly. It was clear Grauberger was drunk, very drunk, judging from his breath. It frankly reeked of the stench of liquor.   
"Can you allow an old man a last wish and will?" Sebastian said and raised his left hand.   
"Of course!"   
Without a word, Sebastian put his left hand index finger and thumb at the corners of his mouth and let fly a high pitched wolf-whistle. It was so high-pitched, that it was barely discernable for human ears. Grauberger winced at the high-pitched whine, but didn't let go of Sebastian's collar.   
"What the fekk was that good for?!" Grauberger growled at the old commissar.   
Sebastian simply smiled a wolf's grin back. "You'll see." he said. Grauberger raised his meaty fist for the blow.   
In the lobby, Cerberus awoke from his nap and twitched his ears, searching for the source of the Call. His master was the only human that knew the Call that was all Cerberus knew. And when the Call came, the master was in trouble. Leaping up and across the counter of the reception in a blur, he ran towards the source of the Call. Cerberus long claws left horrible scratches in the marble floors and several Gyrinxes were sent leaping out of their owners arms as the Callidus wolf-hound ran past with the speed of a rocket. Sadly though, it passed by von Strab and Sela leapt out of her master's arms and ran and hid underneath a table, not to come out in hours.   
Grauberger realized the commotion too late and turned only to see a grey-red-black ball of fur and claws come flying towards him. Instinctively letting go of Sebastian, Grauberger raised his arms to protect himself from Cerberus powerful jaws and tearing claws. With a scream issuing from his lips, Grauberger fell backwards to the ground, eighty full kilos of wolfhound landing on top of him. Noticing no biting, Grauberger lowered his guard and looked straight at the snarling face of Cerberus, standing astride over the big mans body, a low growl coming from Cerberus throat.   
"Enough, Cerberus. He's learned his lesson." Sebastian said and Cerberus obeyed immediately.   
"YARRICK!!" a hoarse voice screamed from behind. Sebastian didn't want to turn, but he did it anyways. He looked at the planetary governor, who was red-faced with rage. 'Oh, God-Emperor, why did I do that?' Sebastian thought darkly to himself.   
"Get yourself and your mangy mutt OUTTA HERE!! NOW!!" von Strab screamed at Sebastian.   
"Yes, milord governor." Sebastian managed after restraining himself from shooting the man. He always had a laspistol with himself, but remembered he'd left it home, because of the party. 'Damn,' Seb thought. A summary execution had been fine now, and Sebastian even had the prosecution laid up in his mind: _"Insulting of Imperial Commissar, punishable with what the commissar see fit"_ according to Commissarial Edict 827f, Sebastian recited to himself in his mind. Now he just hoped that Holt had seen it all, or at least heard it.   
Turning his back towards the angry mob made up of Gyrinx owners, Sebastian called his dog to his side and walked out. As he came to the reception, the receptionist had the guts to heave out: "Leaving early, Mr. Yarrick?"   
Sebastian'd had about enough. He gave the snooty receptionist a stare that could have cut through adamantium and growled:   
"That's Commissar Yarrick to you, you little whippersnapper! Now hand me my greatcoat and cap so I can leave this place!"   
The startled receptionist handed the obviously enraged old man his belongings and watched him leave with his dog.   
As Sebastian got to the door, a big hand on his shoulder tried to stop him.   
"There's no use in trying to make me stay Ed." Sebastian said and sighed heavily. "I've been ordered out of here, by the governor himself."   
"It's not that Seb." Charleston replied. "I just don't want you to end up in trouble. It's a dark night out there, and you're an old man."   
"I can manage on my own." the old man said and shrugged of Charleston's grip. "I've got Cerberus to protect me."   
As Seb walked out the main doors of Infernus Hive Opera House, he turned to Charleston, his eyes shadowed by the peak of his cap, giving him a sinister look.   
"Two more things. Make sure Ishmael gets home safely. He's not the type that can take much liquor. And stop calling me old man." Sebastian said and walked out.   
"Sure, I will." Charleston replied, a slight sadness in his voice.   
As Sebastian walked down the boulevard, he turned towards the opera house and sighed. Why did things always go so wrong for him? As he kept walking home, Sebastian kept pondering on this. Why did no one listen to him? His grandfather hadn't that day when Sebastian had turned 15 and had wanted the Chaos Hound hunting delayed for a day. Luthor von Strab hadn't when Sebastian had warned him of the many fatalities around the Cathayan fugu-fish ten years ago. Fugu. Cathay.   
"I know Cerberus, let's spend this Feast Day at Cheng Fu's Cathayan restaurant, as we usually do. At least you're allowed there, right, old friend?"   
Cerberus gave to a bark as an approvement. Sebastian Yarrick laughed to himself all the way to Cheng Fu's, together with Cerberus's joyful barks. 

Tertius Recreation Island, south of Phoenix Island, three days later   
"If you can stop doing those lobs!" Sebastian said as he threw himself after the LazerBall. He missed it with a hairs width and the ball bounced into the forest behind the LazerBall court.   
"Can't help it Seb." Ishmael said and made a twitching gesture with his right wrist. "'S all in the wrist!"  
"Whatever!" Sebastian replied and chased after the ball into the woods. Holt had allowed him a few days off after von Strab's explosion on him, and Holt had also said Seb could do some usefulness while away. Usefulness had apparently been; _'Keep Charleston of me back!'._  
Sebastian was soon joined in his searching by Charleston, but the big Marine seemed to be pondering on something else than finding a tiny LazerBall. They'd walked a good bit into the woods, when Charleston finally broke the silence.   
"What did you do after you left?" was all he said.   
"I went to Cheng Fu's. After that I went home. Did you get Ishmael home safely, Ed?" Sebastian replied.   
"Yup, and I can say he was more than tipsy by three o'clock. That's when I got him to bed."   
Sebastian made a sign to Charleston to keep quiet. He edged soundlessly further into the forest. Something had caught Seb's attention, and with pure curiosity as driving force, Charleston followed. They walked for a few minutes until they got to the other edge of the forest. It was the Tertius golf course. Said to be one of the finest golf courses in the Imperium. It was the 18th hole as far as Sebastian could tell. He could see the tee from where he was, and wasn't it...?   
_(Author's Note: On the contrary to popular belief, golf isn't native to Earth. Instead, it's a sport which mysteriously appears in all higher standing civilisations and races as soon as it reaches a certain technology standard and the office people and bosses have too little to do on their holidays.) _  
"Ain't we going a bit far away now, Seb?" Charleston asked.   
"Shhh..." Sebastian hissed at the Space Marine. "I believe that's von Strab up there."   
Sebastian pointed at the man at the tee point. He wasn't alone. He had a servitor caddie with him, and somebody else.   
Charleston picked up the magnoculars he had around his neck and took a look in them. He was wearing them because he had to supervise his soldiers later in the day. That was where he was going when he had run into Seb and Ishmael at least. Now he seemed to have forgotten it all.   
"That's von Strab alright." Charleston said and handed the magnoculars to Sebastian so he could have a look. "I don't know about the other two though."   
"Excluding the servitor, they're three." Sebastian said quietly. "von Strab, Grauberger and..."   
Sebastian hesitated a bit and touched the zoom runes on the magnoculars.   
"By holy Saint Armagon!" Seb breathed. "I can't believe it. What is Holt doing here?"   
Sebastian crept closer to the edge of the woods.   
"Careful Seb." Charleston warned. "I've heard von Strab's got a good drive..."   
"Get real Ed!" Sebastian snapped him off. "What are the odds on von Strab getting a ball on the green from there?"   
The **-thwock!-** sound from Herman's club reached Sebastian's ears to late and as he turned, the white ball hitting him hard on his brow. Seb was thrown backwards onto the ground and the ball disappeared into the forest. Charleston ran after the ball and was soon back with it. He pulled Seb a good fifty metres into the forest and hunched over him.   
"You okay?" Charleston whispered. "How many fingers am I holding up?"   
"Hmmmm, eight!?" Sebastian exclaimed, his vision blurred by the whack on his head.   
Charleston looked at the two fingers he'd been holding up and smiled back at Seb. "Good enough! Get up."   
"Now that's a head-in-one!" Sebastian said as he rubbed his forehead where one heck of a lump was forming.   
"How's the head?" Charleston asked as he watched the threesome and the servitor get closer. Holt and Grauberger weren't as good golfers as von Strab on miles distances.   
"It smarts a bit." Sebastian said and tried a half-hearted smile. He looked at the closing men. 

"I see my ball, and Commissar Holt's ball, but I can't see milord von Strab's ball though." Grauberger said and gestured towards his blue ball and Holt's red.   
"Maybe it flew into the woods?" Holt suggested. Holt was a tall man, lean but slightly built. His face had a scar across his right cheek, cut there by a Genestealer claw many years ago. His hair was closely cropped and blond, his eyes blue. Coming into his early forties, he'd been stationed on Armageddon for quite a while, nearly ten years.   
Charleston took careful aim and, muttering the Litany of Secure Aim, threw the little white golf-ball onto the green. It stopped little more than half a metre from the hole.   
"Talk about wonder screw!" von Strab exclaimed. "I believe the Emperor must be smiling on me today!"   
"By all the saints, so must be the case, milord!" Holt said as von Strab received the putter from the servitor.   
"But to get back to business," the governor answered after the sinking the ball into the cup. "What do you think of these reports we've received?"   
Holt realized it was him Herman was talking to.   
"Don't you mean lack thereof? Maybe it's just Jungle animals. After all, it's only two squads of men."   
"Of course, you are probably right James." von Strab said as he and Holt watched Grauberger put.   
Holt got ready for his put but as he swung the club, von Strab cut in.   
"By the way, who will be Yarrick's replacement when he retires?"   
This remark made Holt miss the put and he looked up sharp at the planetary governor.   
"What? Yarrick's going to retire? He hasn't told me anything about something as that? He looked tired last time he came down to the Commissariat, so I gave him a few days off from the reforming mission he has." Holt finally put the ball in the cup and the servitor got a blank look on its face before it told the three men their scores. von Strab had won, but Holt and Grauberger had been close behind though.   
"Though he said this was going to be his last mission, but I thought he meant on Armageddon." Holt said, looking puzzled. "Who told you this?"   
'That's something I also want to know.' Sebastian thought to himself in the bushes, trying to block out the throbbing pain in his forehead.   
"None of real importance." von Strab said and wavered it off. "But till his mission is complete, he remains my tactical advisor. Maybe I should have a talk with him when he comes back from his holidays?"   
"I would also like to have a talk with that old man." Grauberger said and looked disgruntled. "You know what he did with my bodyguards!"   
"You were breaking Imperial Law, he was acting correctly according to the Book of Imperial Law and Punishment!" Holt snapped. He wasn't going to stand here hearing a comrade-in-arm's name being dragged in the dirt. "Drug dealing is breaking paragraph 284/js in volume 5 of Imperial Laws."   
"I never got to deal them, he destroyed your only evidence!" Grauberger answered back.   
"That's is not the matter right now!"   
"Gentlemen," Herman eased them. "Let's not begin arguing over something that happened months ago shall we?"   
"Milord Governor, should I remind you that the cases on the murders of your father and brothers still aren't closed?" Holt said and shot von Strab a devastating glance. von Strab looked taken aback by this. Holt looked dangerous even without his smart, black uniform, and Herman had the feeling that Holt could kill both him and Grauberger with the golf clubs if necessary, and dismiss it as 'Acting for the Imperium's Good'.   
"Let's not talk more about this, shall we?" von Strab said as the three left, the servitor caddie crawling after them on it's mechanical spider's legs. 

"Did you hear that Ed?" Sebastian said as he turned to face Charleston as the others disappeared out of sight.   
"Yuh, our thoughts have been verified." Charleston answered.   
"The plot thickens Ed. I have always thought that Herman killed his own family to seize the power as Governor of Armageddon. Only thing that troubles me is why Holt doesn't stop both Grauberger's and von Strab's actions?"   
"Though that about the missing squads worries me." the lieutenant commander said as he and Sebastian walked back to Ishmael. Seb picked up the LazerBall from the ground as he found it. "I have a Neophyte squad which hasn't reported back, and it's almost a week since it set out from base."   
"I believe we'll just have to wait and see what happens Ed." Sebastian said as they entered the LazerBall court, where a very curious Ishmael waited.   
"Where the fekk have you two been? It can't take that long to find a cursed ball, can it?" Ishmael suddenly saw the big red lump on Seb's forehead.   
"What happened with you Seb?"   
"Long story, but as I probably can't play any more today, I'll tell you as we get back to the hotel." Sebastian replied and picked up his gear.   
"Gee, what for?" Ishmael asked and picked up his own gear.   
"I must get back to Infernus Commissariat, we may have a situation brewing."   
And as the threesome walked back to the hotel, Sebastian explained everything he'd heard to Ishmael. Charleston didn't pay too much attention. He'd heard it before. He smiled to himself over the two old men. Sebastian and Ishmael had been friends since even before the Schola Progenium. They had much in common, mostly their occupation, or in IG's case, ex-occupation. And the fact that they both refused to grow up. That was why they played LazerBall. It was mostly a game for 15 to 18 year olds with good fitness. Seb and IG had made themselves a reputation as LazerBallers back in the Schola Progenium. They were as good now as back then, but the poor youngsters that had been on the neighbouring courts had looked dumbstruck on the two old men playing as LazerBall pros, not believing what they saw.   
Charleston was pulled form his thoughts by Sebastian's voice.   
"Huh, what Seb?" Charleston said as he came back to reality.   
"I said, do you think this is it Ed? McKenzie has made more horrible predictions than ever, and a big Warp Storm has cut off Armageddon from the rest of the Imperium. Or is it just Jungle animals?"   
"Let's hope on Jungle animals." Charleston replied.   
"Told you." Ishmael said from his side. "You're so negative Sebastian." 

Upper hab levels of Infernus Hive, 3 weeks after the Days of the Feast   
"Still don't understand why you harvest your own grapes, Seb." Charleston asked as he let Sebastian stand on his shoulders to cut down the uppermost grapes.   
"Because I like the Callidussian better than those "native" to Armageddon, Ed. Stretch yourself a bit, I can't really reach that one." Seb replied.   
Charleston grunted a bit as he straightened himself. Seb had a balcony to his apartment, or whatever one could call the "balcony". There he had for several years now farmed his own grapes and made his own wine from. With a little help from the Adeptus Mechanicus he'd turned the climate on the large balcony into that of the equatorial regions of Callidus. Sebastian had built some frames out of wood on which the grapevines could grow on, and they certainly had. The ones that stretched the highest were nearly out of Sebastians reach, even when standing on Charleston's shoulders. The one topmost were at the edge of the next balcony on the apartment above.   
"Ed, I said straighten," Sebastian muttered to himself. "Ten-hut!"   
Hearing the order Charleston made a perfect attention and grew one more inch. That was all Sebastian needed to grab hold of the edge and stretch after the last bunch of grapes, but as he did so, he looked over the edge of the upper balcony floor.   
"Aiiie! Look!" a female voice screamed. Sebastian, sweaty and red-faced having a firm grip around the edge, looked shocked at the young woman that was sitting on a sun chair, not wearing more than a bikini. She had obviously been sunbathing, this being the Season of Fire after all, but she hadn't been alone. A tall, muscular man rose from another sun chair and looked curiously at Sebastian. Then a grin split his face and he walked over to Sebastian and knelt down.   
"Well, well, well. If it ain't the old man? Had no idea you looked on girls for fun. But I believe it's common in your age."   
"Now, Grauberger, this is not what it looks like..." Sebastian tried to explain.   
"Oh no Yarrick, you ain't getting away that easy." the big merchant growled.   
"At ease?" Charleston asked from below. "Okeydokey commissar!"   
With that, Charleston let rest and walked away. Sebastian, still holding a firm grip around the edge, fell down half metre before his arm muscles finally got it that they should start working. He fumbled with his feet to find the pole that stuck out of the wall on his left. This part of Infernus Hive was built to liken the houses of old on Armageddon, before the Hives became a reality and industry turned the lush green fields and forests to Ash Wastes. Sebastian's left foot found the pole and he got his foot over it.   
Down on the ground, Charleston paid no attention to what was happening. He was busy taking in the baskets full of grapes, when Seb's doorbell rang. Charleston went and opened it and saw the planetary governor standing on the outside, without Arbiter escort or anything.   
"Is Yarrick here?" he asked, before he saw Cerberus coming up behind Charleston. The wolfhound was not enraptured of seeing the governor. He smelled Gyrinx. A low growl came from the wolf's throat.   
"Get that dog away from me, Lieutenant Commander." Herman said and swallowed. He was aware of how dangerous Cerberus was, the quarter of Chaos-hound making him twice as dangerous and totally fearless. 

"Now Grauberger, make no hasty decisions!" Sebastian squealed, falling very out of character with himself.   
"Keep off my back Yarrick! And especially my dames!" Grauberger said and shoved off Sebastian from the edge. Sebastian landed on the pole, with a leg on each side of it. His face contorted into a wile grimace of pain and agony as he glared up on Grauberger. The merchant just gave him a pleased smile as reply and disappeared from vision. Sebastian let his head fall against the wall as he exhaled for the first time since the pole had smashed into his groin. He tried to hold back the tears of pain, but it was no use. They ran down his face and as he relaxed his grip with his hand around the pole somewhat, he spun round 180 degrees and became hanging upside-down, the pain easing somewhat. Sebastian poked his head through the green roof of the grape plants and looked around. Charleston was nowhere to be seen, but he heard voices and they were coming closer. It was Charleston and von Strab, which he could make out. Instinctively, he ducked back up and hung in a very uncomfortable sort of way, but he was supposed to be reviewing the troops, not harvest grapes. His head disappeared through the foliage just as von Strab and Charleston entered the balcony.   
"I'm sorry 'bout Cerberus, governor. I believe you smell Gyrinx and Cerberus does not like Gyrinxes." Charleston chuckled.   
"Right," von Strab answered, not the slightest bemused. "So, where's the old man?"   
"I don't know really." Charleston said and looked around, confused. "He was here a minute ago."   
"Maybe he got other things to do." von Strab tried. "He's a busy man, after all."   
"But he didn't pass the door of what I know. Maybe he's hiding somewhere?"   
"Never mind," von Strab said and waved off Charleston's question. "Just tell him when you see him that I want to talk to him. I'll be in the tactical room in the Upper Spire."   
With that von Strab left, but as he got to the door, he stopped dead. Seb took a brief moment to relax his back and bent down beneath the foliage and looked at Charleston, who looked back with a confused and shocked expression, and then at von Strab. Seb ducked back up just as Herman turned round to look back at where Seb had been a split second earlier. von Strab walked up to where Seb had hung.   
"What is hanging here then?" Herman said bemused and looked upwards. "A bunch of grapes?" He plucked down a grape and ate it, smiling at its taste.   
"Had no idea Yarrick was growing his own." von Strab said as he left.   
"He likes having a hobby, and he doesn't like the Armageddon grapes so much. You know, the ones grown in Volcanus, Tempestora and Tartarus."   
"I see. Equatorial Callidussian, right?" von Strab asked standing in the doorway.   
"Yup. By the way, I'll tell him governor." Charleston said and closed the door. Turning on the magnetic locks, Charleston went out on the balcony again. Cerberus where already sitting underneath where Sebastian was hanging, the old man's head poking through the foliage again.   
"You okay Seb?" Charleston asked worriedly as he helped the commissar down.   
"I'm fine, except my groin hurts a fekking lot." Sebastian replied and walked inside. "I think I'll have to freeze the grapes, no matter how little I like it. And as soon as the pain abates, I'll go see what the governor wants."   
"Hope you'll wear something else than a singlet and your breeches." Charleston said as he carried the last basket of grapes inside. 

Infernus Hive Spire, Tactical Room, 2 hours later   
Sebastian walked in a quick march as he approached the tactical room. It had been a long time since he'd been used as tactical advisor, but by the Emperor, he had knowledge of tactics. He'd been fed with it from a tender age because of his grandfather. When the other kids had played Loyalists and Traitors, Sebastian had learned how to fight and outwit a real Berzerker opponent, tactical wise and in close combat. He'd read about Imperial Law and Creed when the other had read comic books. Then Sebastian hadn't liked it, but now he was glad he had as he had a great advantage now. His many years of personal experience also paid off.   
As he got to the entry doors, the two fully armoured Arbiters saluted him sharply and Sebastian answered it. With a hiss the entry doors opened, a sound Sebastian thought sounded too much as the hiss of the Ash Waste Cobras. He shrugged of the feeling of foreboding he got when he thought of the creatures. Horrible summed up the sand cobras quite well. He took off his peaked commissar's cap, went into attention and saluted the assembled officers.   
"At ease Commissar Yarrick," von Strab said as he looked up from the map of Armageddon Prime that was projected on the glass of the table the men were assembled around. As Sebastian relaxed, he found much to his chagrin that no chair was empty. Seemed they didn't want him to stay long then. This was not a good sign.   
Sebastian looked around at the assembled men. There was of course von Strab, but also General Hurley of the 1st Steel Legion, Colonel Archer of the 15th Steel Legion, Lord General Terhune of the Planetary Defence Force (PDF for short), Lord Inquisitor Yudka (who made Seb unintentionally shrug), Princeps Kurtiz Mannheim, Princeps Prime of the Iron Skulls Titan Legion, and Commissar Holt.   
Hurley, Archer and Mannheim were temporarily stationed here, that Sebastian knew, so this had to be severe.   
"Commissar Yarrick, may I ask you something?" Herman began. Addressing him with rank wasn't von Strab's way, so this was bad, Seb knew.   
"Go ahead, milord."   
"You know that three weeks ago, Armageddon was 'hit' by an asteroid the size not seen in centuries, millennia's even. Hasn't it bothered you that it never crashed?"   
"Indeed it has." Sebastian replied, feeling the tiny shard of metal inside his greatcoat pocket. He'd put it there when he was at Cheng Fu's and completely forgotten it since. The same went for the paper with the glyph on that Ishmael had handed him.   
"Right, because the answer's simple. It was a Space Hulk, and it has landed."   
The silence after von Strab's words was deafening. Sebastian felt for the first time surprised in twenty years.   
"Maybe it's fate that a warp-storm of immense size has started right now, disabling any help from the rest of the Imperium reaching Armageddon, but on the other hand we won't need it, as I'm fully aware that we can manage on our own." Herman said and smiled.   
Sebastian couldn't take it; he had to put in his word.   
"Permission to speak freely, governor?"   
"Of course Yarrick."   
"I think we should at least send out something to find out what we're facing..."   
"We already know what we're facing, commissar!" the governor snapped him off. "This morning Volcanus Hive fell to an allied force of Berzerkers and and an Orkish Horde under the joined command of Lord Kharn and an Ork Warlord named Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka."   
Sebastian looked shocked at the governor.   
"Is this some sort of joke, milord?" Sebastian queried.   
"No, Yarrick, it isn't," Herman softly replied.   
"Then we MUST inform the Imperium of our, hrm, situation. We cannot fight such a war alone! We need immediate assistance from the Adeptus Astartes!"   
"I told you the warp-storm makes all inter-stellar travel impossible! Besides, we can fight this battle alone! We have got one and a half company of Space Marines already stationed here! We even have a Titan Legion at our disposal!" von Strab shouted. Seb was too well aware of the governor's short fuse. And glory-hunger and incompetence.   
"It's barely ONE Company!" Sebastian shouted with a gesture. "The 8th is still drawing Neophytes!"   
"Okay, have it your way, Yarrick. I'll listen to you." von Strab said and calmed down, pinching the bridge of his nose with his fingers.   
"Good. We can fix it without help from the Imperium, but then you'll have to do exactly as I say. First and foremongst is Kharn's Berzerkers. Never fight a Berzerker on equal terms. He's too good a tactician for that. If you're not careful, he'll outflank you and outmanoeuvre you like that!"   
Sebastian snapped his fingers to emphasize his meaning.   
"Go on, commissar" von Strab said, steepling his fingers.   
"Secondly, the Orks. They're mean and green. That's how far most of your knowledge stretches on orks. More so, they're tough as heck and they're quite capable of surviving in nearly any environment. The ash wastes of Armageddon poses no threat to them. Possibly the sand cobras, but nothing else will. I've never heard of Warlord Ghazghkull Thraka before, but as he's warlord he's undoubtly very powerful."   
"Your advise Yarrick?"   
"With the aid of the Iron Skulls and 8th company of the Death Angels knock them out with an enormous military force in one decisive hammer blow."   
"Thank you." von Strab said and smiled. "Dismissed."   
Sebastian got the shocked look again.   
"B-but, you said that...the foe..." he stuttered forth, completely taken aback by the order.   
"You're my tactical ADVISOR," Herman and looked forgiving. "That doesn't mean I have to listen to you. Besides, we can do this without any help, so don't even think the thought of sending out a distress signal."   
Sebastian stuttered forth something unhearable and involuntarily reached for his holstered laspistol.   
"I'd strongly recommend not doing so, Yarrick. The exit's that way!" and with a gesture von Strab showed were the door was.   
Against his own will, Sebastian left the Tactical Room, ignoring the salutes of the Arbiters. Once again he'd been incapable of doing his duty. The governor had after all broken several Imperial Laws, Seb was sure. In his mind, Sebastian kicked himself for being such a weakling. His grandfather would have shot the brains out of von Strab without blinking. But then again, his grandfather had been the military commander of Armageddon, not von Strab. It was horrifying for Sebastian to realize he would never become as great a commissar as his grandfather.   
When Sebastian got home, he made certain Charleston wasn't there and locked his door securely. After that, he called Cerberus to his knee and as he hugged the big wolfhound, he started weeping tears of shame. 

Princeps Mannheim didn't really listened to von Strab after Yarrick left, neither did Holt. Both had been worried about the old man. In their ears, Seb's 'advise' had sounded like a battle-plan especially made for this. Mannheim woke from his daydream when his name was mentioned.   
"Princeps, if the orks and Berzerkers get through the jungle, which I doubt, do you think you can stop them?" Herman asked.   
"Of course, with support. But shouldn't we do as Yarrick said?" Mannheim asked worriedly.   
"Maybe, but what does he know?" von Strab said with a shrug. The governor went back to explaining his battle plan to the other officers.   
"A fekking lot, it appears." Mannheim thought to himself.   
"Mannheim," von Strab broke Mannheim's thoughts once again. "I want you to move north and engage the enemy."   
"Of course. With who?" the princeps asked.   
"Beg your pardon?" von Strab said with a confused look. "With your Legion of course."   
"Governor, don't say your thinking on sending me up there alone, without infantry support?"   
"What do you think, princeps?" Herman said dryly.   
Mannheim saw in von Strab's eyes that the man was serious. This was madness. No Titan Legion could hold on it's own against an entire enemy force without infantry support.   
"Maybe we should listen to Yarrick." Mannheim said and looked worried.   
"Look here Kurtiz," von Strab said, an undertone of annoyance in his voice. "On this planet I'm in charge now, not the Yarrick family. It's been nearly a hundred years since Commissar General Rolf Yarrick gave my family command of this planet. You do as I say or you can got to Helsreach!"   
"Yes milord." Mannheim said as he realized the insanity that lurked inside von Strab and his orders. "I'll go get ready."   
In his mind, Mannheim thought on how to tell his wife and children he'd never see them again. 

Armageddon Prime, Tower of Doom Ruins 2 weeks later   
It's dawn on Armageddon, a bloody dawn. In the gloom of the ruins one can make out two figures. One huge and bulky and the size of a dreadnought. The arms of the figure end one in a big gun and the other in a pneumatic claw. The other figure, about two metres thirty, looks like a Space Marine with the possible exception of the horns on his helmet and the missing armour on his left arm. Suddenly, the power armour clad warrior starts walking into the ruins.   
"I still don' get why da zog we're 'ere Kharn!?" the bulky figure growled.   
"Because I need to make myself whole after all these years Ghazghkull." Kharn said and looked around. He'd left it in it's pedestal, but where?   
"Waddaya mean wiv 'ole again?" Ghazghkull said and walked closer, the adamantium of his partially metal skull glittering in the dawning light.   
"Once, I had this planet in my grasp, but I lost it. The Imperial lackeys shuns this area, so it's probably gonna be here still."   
"A weapun?" Ghazghkull asked walking even closer.   
"Yes, a very potent weapon." Kharn realized Ghazghkull was getting dangerously close the edge. "Don't walk any further!"   
"Why not?" the huge Ork Warlord asked in his deep voice.   
"Because anyone who enters the Arena I must challenge. Only four has ever escaped alive." Kharn went back to searching.   
"Which four wuz dat?"   
"They were the Space Outlaws and that Commissar I've told you about."   
"Oh, dat Yarrick..." Ghazghkull's voice trailed off. "I fink 'Umie commissurrs have smart hats. Uzbex, a big boss uv mine, collects 'em."   
"That's a nice hobby." Kharn said as he started digging with his bare hands on a place.   
"Ya nevvur nailed dat Yarrick, why not?"   
"'Cause he was a bit slippery..." Kharn said as he dug deeper, cursing Armageddon and it's ash wastes as well as the Yarricks.   
"He's got a grandson though. Heard he's quite an expert on orks." Kharn continued as he dug. Just a little further...   
"Is he a commissurr?" Ghazghkull asked curiously.   
"Yeah, but he's old now. Probably won't fight much more, sorry to spoil the fun. Anyways, the Yarricks are mine!"   
"Righto Kharn." Ghazghkull muttered and kicked a 15-kilo rock away a good hundred metres. After all Kharn had told him about the Yarricks, Ghazghkull was quite hoping for a good fight. Seemed impossible now, Kharn wanting the 'Umie for himself and the man being old. Ghazghkull weren't an expert on humans, but he knew they began to leak when one punched them too hard and that old humans broke much more easily. He remembered the commissar he'd broken the back on and then trampled the old human's arm. It had been very easy, Ghazghkull remembered. Old humans weren't fun.   
"YESSSS!!" Kharn shouted as he pulled forth his trusty old axe from beneath the sand. "Behold Warlord Ghazghkull Thraka, the ultimate weapon!"   
"Now dat's a zogging 'uge choppa!" Ghazghkull shouted astonished.   
"It's more than a 'choppa' my friend. It's the most powerful deamon weapon in the galaxy! Deamon Lord Kharn, welded it, second in power to the King of Deamons himself, Kharzhan! An Eldar Craftworld had it, but the sissies were probably afraid of using it. I liberated them of their burden and since then, the Axe of Khorne has been mine! Once again, I'm made whole!!"   
As Kharn's mad laughter echoed in the ruins, Ghazghkull felt his green skin get prickly. There was something very wrong with this human.   
"'Oo made da choppa?" Ghazghkull finally asked.   
"Huh?"   
"Wot's da name of da mek wot made dat choppa?" Ghazghkull repeated.   
"This weapon my friend, was forged by the best smith through time, but also the bane of all deamons. It was forged with hatred, the very essence of the deamons. Still, it's not as potent as Kharzhan's personal blade, but it's second best..."   
"'Oo da zog made it Kharn!?"   
Kharn eyes turned hard on Ghazghkull.   
"Why do you want to know?" the Berzerker Lord said in a low, whispering tone.   
Ghazghkull found no answer on the question so he decided to leave it at that. Something else took his attention. An Ork Nob was shouting something on orkish.   
"What does he want Ghazghkull?" Kharn asked.   
"Boss Tufzog sez somefing about 'Umie Gargants."   
"Titans," Kharn muttered to himself. "Any suppport?"   
Ghagzhkull yelled something unintelligible back to Tufzog, who replied just as oddly.   
"No, no suppurt."   
Kharn smiled to himself. "By the Throne of Skulls, they're more stupid than I thought." 

Infernus Hive, a week after the destruction of the Iron Skulls Titan Legion and loss of Death Mire hive   
"Lord Astropath Zebulon, you must send out the distress signal!" Sebastian nearly begged the psyker to do it. Armageddon Prime was nearly lost, and the loss of Hive Tempestora would prove a serious blow towards the forces of the Imperium. The tank factories in Tempestora was all that stood between the Imperial forces and total destruction on Prime, and Sebastian wouldn't such a minor thing as an order from the governor keep him from saving billion lives.   
"Sorry commissar, but without clearance from the governor or an inquisitor, I can't send out the psychic distress beacon. Laws, you know." Zebulon replied with a gesture of sadness.   
"Don't you understand!? Armageddon is being destroyed because of the governor and I don't trust the Inquisition for two seconds!" Sebastian shouted, feeling agitated.   
"Commissar Yarrick, maybe it is you who don't understand?" Zebulon said and stood up, his skeleton like frame wrapped in green robes. "I have my creeds and edicts to follow, just as you do. Mine, on the other hand, are there for my colleagues and my own security."   
"Believe me Zebulon, if you don't do as I say, you won't leave Armageddon alive..." Sebastian muttered between clenched teeth.   
"Is that a threat, commissar?" the two metres tall psyker-skeleton said.   
"No, a fact." Sebastian replied with a steely gaze. The Astropath seemed to understand and sat down.   
"Right, I'll send out a distress signal. But beware, an Inquisitor may pick it up and wonder what's wrong."   
Sebastian sat down on a chair a good ten metres away from the psyker. He felt so uncomfortable in their proximity. He realized his skin had turned to goose flesh and tried to shake of the feeling. Sebastian felt something heavy land in his knee and saw that Cerberus rested his big, furry head in his lap. The big wolfhound didn't like psykers either it seemed. Seb gently stroke Cerberus' grizzled fur, remembering when he'd gotten the dog as a pup. It had made him forget for many years his grandfather and that horrible day. He'd fled to Armageddon after completing his Commissar's training to forget, and Cerberus had helped him somewhat. But one day he'd stumbled upon a statue of his grandfather in Volcanus Hive. Sebastian had been 28 at that time, new to his duty, assigned to a Steel Legion nicknamed the Armadillos after the creatures out in the Wastelands. He'd fallen to his knees and wept as he remembered what he'd done when he saw the statue of the Liberator of Armageddon, The Wolf, Commissar General Rolf Yarrick. Since that day, Sebastian had never for one day forgotten his "mistake".   
Suddenly, Cerberus raised his head so quickly it made Seabstian start. A low growl came from the hound's throat. Seb knew immediately what was happening.   
"They're here..." he said quietly to himself, considering how good his odds were if he were to...? Sebastian shook his head and banished the thought. It would only get him into more trouble.   
"Nearly done..." the Astropath mumbled, Seb glancing towards him, quickly regretting it, seeing that Zebulon seemed more skeletal than ever, blood dripping from the psyker's nose. The taste of metal was in the air because of the psychic powers. Cerberus bark woke Seb from his daily nightmare as he'd watched the psyker. Seconds later, a squad of Arbiters broke into the room, armed with combat shotguns. After them came their Judge.   
"Commissar Yarrick!" the Judge called. "You're under arrest for breaking Article 3543, Section 6; Disobeyment of superior order!"   
"What!?" was all that Sebastian got out, grabbing good hold on Cerberus, who'd spotted a cyber-mastiff amongst the Arbiters.   
"Do not attempt to flee, it will only make it worse." the Judge said in a calm voice.   
"The only superior I have is the Emperor of Mankind!" Sebastian shouted as two Arbiters disarmed him and put handcuffs on him.   
"Wrong!" a voice called from the corridor. Sebastian knew it too well.   
"As long as you're here Yarrick, I'm your superior." von Strab said and stood himself before Sebastian. He spotted the clearly pissed Cerberus and took a few steps backwards.   
"Do something about that wolf too!" von Strab ordered the Arbiters. One tried to put a mouth buckle on Cerberus, but ended with a very bloody arm instead.   
"Get them Cerberus!" Sebastian shouted. The old wolfhound jumped on the cyber-mastiff and tore the robot-dog's head from its body. Cerberus was about to jump on another Arbiter, when the Judge pulled his hell pistol and shot.   
"NO!" the old commissar screamed as the powerful laser shot hit his old friend in the side, throwing him to the floor. Bashing himself free from the two Arbiters that were holding him, Sebastian rushed to his dog's side. This couldn't be true...   
"Fekking bastards!" Seb mumbled to himself, feeling anger inside himself he hadn't felt for many years. "I hope for your sake judge, that he isn't dead! Because if he is..."   
"He's stunned." the Arbiter Judge cut him off. "Do you really think I would kill an innocent animal? Only humans make mistakes."   
"You're making one right now, following von Strab's orders!" Sebastian growled. "Wait till Holt hears about this!"   
"There's no need in wasting your phone call on me, Yarrick. I'm already here." Holt said calmly as he entered. "I've heard all of it, and I'm sorry to say it, but Yarrick, you have disobeyed a direct order from the planetary governor of Armageddon. There's not much I can do about it, either."  
"Right," Sebastian said and looked the present men over. "I'm coming with you, but firstly I want to know what's going to happen to me."   
"You're going to be banished from Infernus Hive." von Strab answered him. "I can't have you executed, that would cause some raised eyebrows, so I'm sending you off to Hades Hive. I heard you were born there, so why not spend some time there again, no?"   
"Do I have a choice?" Sebastain replied and met von Strab with a steady, steely gaze. With that the Arbiters left, carrying Cerberus with them. Von Strab and Holt stayed in the Astropath Chamber. Zebulon looked up at them.   
"Did Yarrick manage to send a signal?" Herman queried.   
"No, and I had the Astropath Creed on my side." Zebulon replied calmly and quietly. This tone made both Holt and von Strab shrug.   
"Good." von Strab said and left with Holt.   
As the metal doors closed with a hiss, Zebulon smiled to himself.   
"No, Yarrick didn't send a signal. I did." the Astropath said to himself.   
And with that he closed his eyes and entered the Immaterium to send another distress signal, focused on a special mind. 

Hades Hive Spire Space Port, 2 days later, Hive Tempestora under siege   
Sebastian wasn't welcomed by cheering crowds when the Thunderhawk landed in Hades. Instead, the spaceport seemed rather dead. Not a man as far as he could see.   
"Let's go," Seb said to Cerberus after a moment of silence. Cerberus was sporting a bandage around his ribs where he'd been shot, being lucky that las-weapons fuse the flesh together after they'd hit. That the shot hadn't been so powerful had saved him too. Though it had been enough to throw Cerberus off his paws.   
The two walked for a few minutes until a voice called their attention.   
"Commissar Yarrick! Good to see you here!" a man called. He was thickset and seemed to be in his early fifties, his hair beginning to grey at his temples. Though the man was thickset, he was still a good ten centimetres taller than Sebastian. Seb recognized him immediately.   
"Michael Atris!" Seb exclaimed. "What brings you here?" the commissar asked, although he already knew the answer.   
"You, who else?" Atris said as he joined Seb and Cerberus. "When I heard you were going to be banished here, I sighed in relief, in fact."   
"I see," Sebastian said and the two men and the dog walked off towards a turbo-lift that would take them to a lower level in the Spire. As they entered the lift and it began taking them down the nearly two miles to the level where Sebastian had been assigned to live. It was in the Upper Levels, not far from Hive Hades Ruler's home, but still, Hades was notorious for it's many gangs. There was a long moment of silence until Atris broke it. 

"Going with light luggage I see," he said, indicating Seb's lone bag. It was a standard issue Imperial Guard equipment bag. It was made from a durable textile in black, with a gold Imperial Eagle on it together with the text: 

**Imperial Commissar Sebastian Yarrick **  
_"The Emperor knows, the Emperor watches"__ _

_  
_The motto was probably sewn into place later than the rest, Artis could tell.   
"I weren't really allowed to pack down my entire home. This bag was all I managed to get with me." Seb said and looked at the Hive Ruler.   
"And your weapons, I see." Artis said and looked down on the chain sword hanging from a chain underneath Sebastian's Ordo Imperialis on his left side. On his right side, his laspistol was sitting in its holster. Sebastian seemed armed and ready for battle, which was much the case.   
"Out of pure curiosity, what is in that bag of yours, Sebastian?"   
"Clothes, of course," Seb began. "Some extra tunics and breeches, data-slates containing information about Orks and Berzerkers, and of course my family gems."   
"Orks and Berzerkers?" Artis asked, sounding surprised, which he was.   
"So you don't know what we're facing? Armageddon is facing an all out invasion of Berzerkers and Orks. This makes Kharn's last assaults seem like walks through the park. And we're having an incompetent Commander. Great..." Sebastian sighed and fell silent.   
"He won't listen to you, right?" Artis said and looked softly on the old commissar with his blue eyes. Sebastian wished he could meet Artis with the same soft eyes, but he couldn't.   
"He's incompetent to the extreme, Michael. And it's all because he's a full-blood aristocrat. His father Luthor, may the Emperor watch over his soul, had worked hard to get his title, but not by assassinating his brothers and father, like Herman. Luthor worked his way hard to make his father understand he was the most suitable inheritor of the throne of Armageddon."   
"You still believe that Herman was behind the murders, Sebastian?"   
"Of course. I wonder why Holt hasn't nailed him? He's got sufficient proof." Sebastian said and scratched his cheek. He hadn't shaved this morning; there hadn't been time for such.   
"Maybe he's being bribed?" Artis suggested. Seb gave him a shocked look, like what he said was more than impossible.   
"I mean," Artis explained "Holt's only human, after all. You can never know."   
"Of course." Sebastian replied as the elevator slowed down to a halt and they walked out. Seb saw the enormous plaza he was going to live beside under the conflict. There were much people here, seemed to be some sort of market day. Around the hexahedral plaza, dozens of levels of habs raised up into the Spire. The outside of all hives was just a sort of shell. On the inside several smaller 'hives' were. Seb was now standing on one of the levels of one of these mini-hives, looking down at the plaza a hundred metres below him. He felt a nearly boyish urge to spit down on the crowds below to see if he could hit someone, but restrained from doing so. Walking away from the railing Seb fixed on the huge crystal tree in the middle of the plaza. It looked like one of our oaks but it was about a hundred times larger. Seb couldn't remember that it had been here last time he'd been in Hades. As he watched, a paper-thin crystal leaf fell down in the water of the artificial lake that surrounded the tree. It was mechanical, Sebastian thought. It **HAD** to be mechanical.   
"What do you think of our Elysian Crystal Oak?" Artis said and smiled. "It's a real tree, if you wonder."   
"It's biological?" Seb said astounded. "I thought it had to be mechanical or some sort of biotech."   
"It's neither. It's a living crystal. There are many such things on Elysion. Most remarkable are the Sapphire Rays and the Ruby Lizards. They're protected by Imperial Law and can't be brought off-planet, but the Crystal Oaks aren't. This one was taken from Elysion maybe thousands of years ago and has stood here since. It's as hard as diamond, so not even a Leman Russ could blast it apart."   
"Yes, I've heard of the crystal planet." Sebastian said and pulled away his eyes from the oak and started walking again. "Believe my grand-father was there some time. He brought home an Emerald Raven. I think he had permission for it, of course."   
"Bet he had. He was an Imperial Commissar General, and such have pull. Did it survive long?"   
"Not long, I believe Callidus sun was too much for it. As it was a crystal animal, it turned quite stiff. It's one of the gems I have with me."   
There was another long pause of silence, broken by the murmur of the crowd far down below. This time, however, Sebastian broke the silence.   
"Artis, I must ask you of a favour." Seb said in a troubled voice.   
"Go ahead, commissar."   
"Can you put every working man on reinforcing the blast doors and the Shell? After that, I want to have a list of every man here who's got experience, either in the Imperial Guard, the PDF or in the Gangs. Make that every man and woman, above eighteen."   
"Ay, ay Commissar." Artis answered with a smart salute. "I understand, I've been in the Navy, many years ago."   
"Artis, you haven't been closer to the Black Sea of space than a bathtub." Sebastian snapped. 

Tempestora Hive, the same afternoon   
"Say again, Commander?" Captain Mikos of the 8th Assault Company said to his commander over the roar of the Gargant siege guns.   
"I said: fall back and take as many civilians with you as possible!" Charleston roared back over the storming guns.   
"Why, sir?" Mikos said and raised a questioning eyebrow. Mikos was around fifty years old but had a childlike face and yellowish hair. He looked quite young had it not been for the numerous scars on his face.   
"We're abandoning the Hive! Tempestora is dead! I'm not even doing this on the Overlord's orders. I'm acting as the Emperor wants!"   
"That's why we don't have any support?" Mikos asked as the two blasted off up in the sky with their jump-packs and landed on a roof. Fifteen Marines with gold-helmets followed them. They were Mikos and Charleston's Honour Guard, the personal bodyguard of Death Angel commanders and officers, the absolute elite of warriors and often equipped with jump-packs and the best weaponry the Imperium can offer.   
"Yep." Charleston simply replied as the landed and surveyed the battle tearing apart Hive Tempestora from above. The Berzerkers weren't many, and that troubled Charleston. Kharn allying with some other force wasn't uncommon, but the few Berzerker squads he'd met and gotten reported over the helmet vox-links was bothering. Why so few? There weren't even any trace of the Terminators that Kharn had under command. Something was fishy with this entire invasion. He had to get to Seb as soon as possible and tell him about this. That something wasn't right. Sebastian didn't have his grandfather's sixth sense of knowing what Kharn was up to. He didn't have the personal grudge, but still had a good reason for one...   
"Mikos, there should be some Thunderhawks left up in the Spire that the nobles houses left behind. I'm going to pull out with the forces down here and salvage as many civilians as possible. You take the Honour Guard and take the Thunderhawks up in the Spire, with force from the nobles, if needed. Cram the Thunderhawks full of people, preferably workers, we'll need tank-constructors and weapons-manufacturers, not nobs."   
"Yes sir!" Mikos said, saluted and with a simple order, the fifteen Honour Guard followed him as he put jump-pack on full blast and flew up into the Spire.   
Charleston watched his aide fly upwards, but there was no sign of relief on his face. Rather the opposite. Mikos was young, for a Space Marine, and eager to prove himself. Charleston could bet he wanted to be transferred to one of the Battle Companies instead of 8th, which was a Reserve Company after all. But it hadn't been used like one lately. The numerous battles it was used in were because McGranth had begun using startlingly aggressive tactics. McKenzie couldn't be behind it, Charleston thought. McKenzie had his hands full of Genestealers and that Magos Grimjaw, who'd returned from death, in some odd way. McKenzie ranting about this wasn't worth listening to, Charleston had thought.   
"Good luck, Brother Mikos." Charleston said and flew away down towards the hab-level plaza where some of the fiercest fighting was being done. As he flew over the plaza, he saw another squad of Berzerkers. God-Emperor, they had spread out. But still, the sixteen Berzerkers were just red spots in a sea of green-hided Orks. 'Like my boys.' Charleston thought darkly to himself. The Death Angels were so hopelessly outnumbered. They hadn't suffered heavy causalities, but where slowly being pushed back as wave after wave of Orks came storming. Charleston landed in the thick of the fighting, power sword and plasma pistol at the ready.   
It was like being hit by a heat wave, the stench of the Orks were overwhelming. McKenzie often complained about Charleston's lack in personal hygiene. That was like nothing compared to the rotten stench from the Orks, their teeth yellow and their breaths vile like a predator's. One of them jumped at Charleston, only to be cut in half by the huge Marine. Charleston was probably the tallest Marine ever, bar the Emperor himself, but still the Orks were a good 2 metres tall. And the more powerful an Ork was, the bigger he seemed to get. Charleston had listened to Sebastian and Ishmael's conversation about the Ork the size of a Dreadnought walker. Charleston shrugged slightly at the thought of facing that beast.   
Before he knew what had happened, he'd carved a path through the Orks and, followed by twenty Marines, he now stood face-to-face with the Ork Warboss, which commanded this warband. The bodyguards themselves were the size of a normal Marine, some of them clad in that mega armour Seb had talked about. With a mighty roar the Angels of Death and the Orks charged each other. The Orks that weren't dressed in mega armour fell quickly to the chain swords of the Marines. But before Charleston knew what was happening, the Orks seemed to get the upper hand. The chain swords couldn't pierce the thick armour of the remaining bodyguard, and the snipping power-claws of the Orks cut down the Marines as nothing. Feeling the anger burning inside of him of the loss of his brother-warriors, Charleston charged the Warboss, which had just beheaded Sergeant Young with its big, crude chain-axe. The Ork swung at him with incredible speed, but Charleston ducked away. The chain-axe tore of his helmet instead, which was dangling from the mag-chain in Charleston's belt.   
"For that, I'll take your helmet instead, Ork-scum!!" Charleston roared. The Warboss was wearing a big, black helmet with huge horns on it.   
"No, yoo won't Oomie! Dis iz a Waaagh! All Oomies die!! Da red deamon 'as said so!" the Warboss roared as he plunged his chain-axe in a wide arc, trying to catch Charleston in it's reach. Charleston was shocked on hearing an alien, a crude and savage Ork for the matter; speak Low Gothic, though he had obvious problems with pronunciation. He thought he ducked and evaded slashes and swings from that huge chain-axe for five minutes before he saw a drop in the warboss' guard. Ramming his power sword deep into the chest of the Ork, Charleston pulled himself close to the Ork's face and hissed:   
"See your deamon gods in hell! This planet belongs to the Emperor and not Kharn!"   
With that Charleston put all his weight on the sword and forced it downward, carving open the Ork from chest cavity to groin. As Charleston pulled out the sword with a powerful jerk, the Ork Warboss still stood up for half a minute, before falling over. Stone dead.   
Picking up the warboss' helmet and putting it on his own head, Charleston looked around. He fended of another Ork deftly and, using the vox-link hanging on his ear, he ordered all the Marines to fall back using pattern Omega7. That was a fall back technique only used by the 8th Company of the Death Angels.   
"That should surprise them." he thought and yelling the order to fall back, flew out of the combat and took flight to the Shuttle Bays on Hab-level 23. The entire of the 8th Company followed him as a whole. The Orks, to confused or to surprised, didn't pursue. The Berzerkers, on the other hand, had their orders. This was all going according to plan... 

Infernus Hive, 6 days later   
Overlord Herman von Strab was looking through some reports on data-slates, when Commander Charleston burst into his office. The big Marine hadn't even bothered to remove his armour, though he had been smart enough to take off the jump-pack. On Charleston's face was a look of anger, perfectly well qualifying him for 'Most Disgruntled Person of the Year'. von Strab understood the man's temper quite well. The reports he'd read from Tempestora were disheartening.   
"It's lost!" Charleston said after standing quiet for a few minutes. "Armageddon Prime is lost, and you know why, dontcha?"   
"I wasn't prepared for an assault this size, Commander." Herman replied, looking up from the data-slate he was reading.   
"As fekk you were!" Charleston snapped. "There has been plenty of bad omens recently! Most notably the statue of the Emperor in Helsreach's Prime Church wept bloody tears just before the day of the Feast!"   
"I haven't been informed about it."   
"Oh, you have, by Commissar Yarrick even! You've just chosen to ignore him!" Charleston growled. If he just had the authority to remove Herman from his position, but only a Grand Commander or Commissar could perform such an act. Thinking of commissars, where was Seb?   
"Speaking of the same," Charleston said in a milder tone. "Where is he?"   
"Commissar Yarrick? I banished him to Hades Hive." von Strab answered without as much as blinking or looking up from the report. Seemed Hive Monitor Artis was up to something, reinforcing his blast-doors and Hive Shell.   
"You what?" Charleston asked shocked.   
"I banished him to Hades Hive because he disobeyed a direct order from me." Herman said and looked up again. "As a matter of fact, I had thought of executing the bastard, but Holt got me on other thoughts."   
"Executing!?" Charleston shouted in surprise. "If you'd had him shot, I'd kill ya with me bare hands!"   
"That is the punishment for disobeying orders, the same for deserting the Guard, Yarrick should know. He's a commissar."   
What followed von Strab words was an uneasy silence. The last sentence had taken Charleston aback. He was in a loss of words. von Strab was crazy, that was clear. And that Holt, he seemed to cover the governor's back, but why? He was a commissar, just like Sebastian. Charleston finally came up with what to say.   
"I just wanted to inform you, governor, that the enemy forces will probably go through the Jungle soon, so I'd recommend you to move your HQ." "They'll never make it through the Jungle, Lieutenant Commander. Never. It's too damn thick."   
"You think so? It takes my scouts one month to move through the jungle on foot, and they're rookie Marines. How long time, or for that sake short time won't it take an army of veteran Berzerkers and Orks to move through it?"   
With that, Charleston left the office. von Strab was left in deep contemplation.   
"Maybe he's right." he said to himself. "Maybe I should move my HQ to some other Hive. Acheron, for example. Yes, Acheron's good."   
Reaching with his finger to the vox-channel to inform his secretary, hestitating for a moment, but then pressing it, Herman called:   
"Miss Renton, get me Commissar Holt. I want to talk to him."   
Settling back in his big office chair, lighting a cigar, he thought on what was happening in Hades Hive. What was Artis up to? Then it struck him what was happening. It struck him like a lightning bolt and Herman spat out the cigar.   
"YARRICK!" he shouted hoarsely. 

Infernus Hive, 4 months later   
The Berzerker assault came swift, they poured out of the Equatorial Jungle like a blood red sea. One thousand warriors of Khorne; a full company of Space Marines. Charleston saw them come at dawn. A swift army, mounted on bikes and in Rhino transports. Some even were riding in the fearsome Land Raider tanks, the worst of the tanks the Imperium could produce. He didn't, wouldn't believe his eyes when he saw the flashes of light from the jump-pack equipped Berzerkers. Raptors, they were called. Rare sight, those Berzerker Raptors. Raising the magnoculars to his eyes and zooming in he saw Kharn at the front, wearing his own jump-pack. Charleston remembered he'd found brothers of the 8th without jump-packs, snatched by the Berzerkers to use on their own. Charleston felt the spite rising in his throat at the thought of the vandalized suits of armour, belonging to the dead.   
"Good thing we managed to evacuate the Hive." he thought to himself. "So many civilian lives we left at Tempestora makes me queasy."   
Seeing the Berzerker army come to a halt at the very gates of Infernus Hive surprised Charleston a bit. But it also gave him a ray of hope.   
"It won't be so here, this war ends with Infernus." 

Down on the ground, Kharn walked forward, the mighty Axe of Khorne in his hand. He was going to give that fool Charleston a chance on surrendering and joining him. The time they'd taken on waiting out the Imperials was going to pay off. The long time had probably made their guard slacken. Kharn hoped so at least.   
"Lieutenant Commander Charleston!! Show me your face, you Imperial worm!" Kharn shouted up towards the barricade facing him. His shout was amplified by the helmet's vox-system. Those words made his soldiers feel better, Kharn knew. Some were newly converted, the colour of their old Legions shining through the gore and gold colour of the Berzerkers Horde, so they needed proof they were the only real warriors. All others were worms.   
"Whaddya want, ya little piece of traitor dung!?" Charleston snapped back. Kharn scanned the rows of Marines up on the barricade and soon found Charleston. He was standing a head taller than the others.   
"Charleston, I give you one last chance. Join my forces, and we'll crush this pathetic Imperium ruled by a carcass!" Kharn did with a lively gesture.   
"Go to Helsreach!" Charleston snapped.   
"I'm just telling you the truth, brother warrior. What can this Imperium offer you, which Khorne can't? Battles, that is what a Space Marine lives for. What do you think will happen to you and all other Marines, when universal peace is acquired? You won't be needed any more. They'll get rid of you."   
"I'm not so stupid I'll fall for that one. The Emperor can offer me ten times as much as your fallen god."   
"It's the truth, lieutenant! You call us renegades, but we're Marines who've seen the light, who understand what will happen with us when we're not needed any more."   
"There is always wars for us Marines to fight, and don't call me brother! Traitor!"   
'Boy, he's slow.' Kharn thought darkly to himself. 'I called him that half a minute ago.'   
"Think of it Charleston! You wouldn't need to serve under incompetent commanders any more. You'd be your own commander."   
"It's no use Kharn. I know your tricks. Your honey-coated tongue can't shake my faith in the Emperor of Mankind. He created this Imperium and he created us! We will succeed!"   
"No you won't!" Kharn shouted, losing his temper. He showed Charleston the axe so the dumb loyalist could clearly see the power Kharn held.   
"See this, Charleston? See this!? It's the Axe of Khorne! I had it once, but it was taken away from me by those pesky Omega Squadron Outlaws and Commissar General Yarrick, but what did that do for good? I have it once again; I'm made whole again! With this Daemon Weapon, welded once by Daemon Lord Kharn Fleshtearer himself, King Kharzhan's right hand, I am invincible! It's the most powerful weapon in the galaxy and with it in my hands nothing can stop me!! Not the Imperial Guard, not the Legio Titanicus, not the Adeptus Astartes, not you, not Yarrick!!"   
Charleston slowly realized his mistake. Keeping a steady gaze on Kharn, he whispered in his vox-link to Mikos.   
"Take half of eighth and get the fekk out of here. The renegade is right. We don't stand a damned chance against him now."   
"So, what it's gonna be Charleston!?" Kharn shouted. "Surrender or prepare for your death at the hand of the Axe of Khorne. Or should that be the Axe of Kharn!?"   
"Kharn," Charleston called down. "If you're going to take this Hive, it's going to over my dead body!"   
"My pleasure," Kharn thought grimly. "That can be arranged, worm! CHARGE!!!!!"   
Kharn's roar was out-classed by the mighty "Blood for the Blood God! Skulls for the Skull Throne!!" that was shouted from the lips of every Berzerker as the gore-coloured horde stormed against Infernus Hive.   
"Oh Emperor," Charleston whispered in his vox-link to his warriors. "May You hath mercy on our Souls and guide them to Your side..."   
Then the Battle for Infernus Hive begun. A battle in which centuries of hatred erupted as the Angels of Death and the Berzerkers of Khorne clashed in the streets of the Hive. Charleston and Kharn never met, but their warriors did, and around a hundred Marines on each side fell before Charleston abandoned the Hive. Kharn ordered his men to hold. They'd taken what they'd come for.   
Two days after Infernus Hive was taken by the Berzerkers, the chandelier in Infernus Opera house was torn down and destroyed. 

Hades Hive 4 days later   
Commissar Sebastian Yarrick looked out the great view-port of Hades Hive and saw the sea of green skinned warriors outside. They camped on both sides of the river Euminedes. It seemed quite weird that a sea of green being broken by a nearly grey river. He'd received messages from the Orks in the shape of captured humans, probably from Volcanus or Tempestora, humans with their hands or eyes cut out, some poor fellows even had gotten into the way of the Ork Meks. Some of those had minor bionic implants and some extreme cases had grot-braintransplants. They all carried the same message with them: _Surrender or die!_   
The first one to come in with that message had been Colonel Archer. He was taken care of now, medics tending him every minute.   
Looking away from the horde outside, Sebastian sighed. They would attack soon he knew so. The siege guns of the Gargants had silenced, which meant the Orks were preparing for an attack. Sebastian had seen a huge banner pole out in the green sea and read the glyphs on it. This was an army belonging to an Ork Warlord named Ugulhard. Seb had heard of Ugulhard's Chargers. Their Warlord, Ugulhard, was notorious for his assaults, but Ugulhard bowing down before another Ork Warlord, that meant this Ghazghkull Thraka held power indeed. Ugulhard also had a big Ork Battle-claw, very much like the power-claws, but of an older design.   
A messenger tore Sebastian from his thoughts.   
"Excuse me Commissar Yarrick, but I have some messages for you." the young boy said. Seb guessed he could be older than eighteen and he probably wouldn't survive the war. Sebastian swallowed hard at the thought.   
"Thanks," Seb said as he received them. He handed the boy fifteen Imperial credits as a tip. The boy lightened up at the money and bowed deeply and ran off. Seb looked after him a long while until he opened the messages. The first one was from Ishmael. He had written that Holt had called him back to duty, as all commissars available were needed. He'd been stationed in Helsreach Hive to serve with the PDF and Lord General Terhune. He also wrote that an enormous Ork force was coming to Helsreach, but he'd never let Helreach fall. The entire of Helreach population, 10 billions all in all, had volunteered to defend their homes. He wished Sebastian luck and was sorry for that he'd been banished. There was also post scriptum:   
"I'd check on Holt if I were you. He's been acting strange lately and he's grown gaunt in his appearance." it read.   
"Good luck to you, old friend." Seb mumbled to himself, as if IG was in psychic communion with him. 10 billion, that was more than the 5 billions that Hades population were, and still, only a million had military training in any form. Sebastian sighed. There had to be the same number of Orks out there. That he was sure of.   
The other message was from Charleston. Charleston had obviously written it in a hurry, so his messages, which were usually hard to read, nearly became impossible to read. There were misspellings everywhere. But Seb could make out what he meant. Charleston and the whole of 8th was speeding to Hades Hive in their Thunderhawks, and would probably be there in six or seven hours.   
"If we're still alive then Ed." Seb said and closed the data-slate with a snap. He walked out of the office and took the turbo-lift to the ground levels. He'd managed to keep Atris out of going into battle by saying the Hive Monitor was needed elsewhere. He also needed someone to look after Cerberus. Cerberus had fought against many foes through time, but he was wounded and Sebastian didn't wan't to lose his best friend.   
When Yarrick stepped out of the elevator, he seemed to have changed in appearance. At least the welders at the blast-doors thought so. They had met an old man, shortened by age, slightly built and with slumped shoulders. What stepped out of the elevator was the most fearsome commissar they'd ever had seen. They knew it was Commissar Yarrick though; the blue-grey hair was hard to miss even though he was wearing his peaked cap. He just seemed to have gotten taller, more muscular and broad-shouldered. They just didn't understand how it made sense, such a transformation of a human. Sebastian walked up to the colonel of the Hive Defence Force who'd been supervising the soldiers and organized them into companies as they'd arrived.   
"Are we ready, Colonel Logan?" Sebastian asked the tall colonel.   
"As ready as can be. We'll take anything those Orks throw against us." Logan replied with a grin.   
"I really hope so..." Sebastian said and turned on his chain-sword. He always had his sword hanging from his left side, even though he was left-handed. But Imperial Commissars' uniforms were made for right-handed people, with the pistol holster always sitting on the right side. Seb didn't like it. It was making things difficult, but beggers can't be choosers. He was brought from thoughts by the shouts of warning from a watchtower.   
"Now it begins..." Sebastian said in a whisper. "The Battle for Armageddon."   
The two forces met in a hideous roar of guns and screams of dying and wounded. Sebastian parried and slashed with his chain-sword. Each cut brought down a green-skinned beast. The soldiers saw the old man fight for the Imperium with vigour they didn't think possible, but it brought hope to their hearts and they attacked Orks with their lasguns and bayonets. Sebastian was far from the only commissar present. He didn't understand how, but after fifteen minutes of fierce hand-to-hand, he was joined by four other commissars, all of them belonging to Armageddon's Commissariat, all of them younger then him, but they fought with experience and they formed a black spear that drove deep into the Ork horde. But as sudden as the young commissars had joined him, they disappeared. Sebastian didn't want to think on why.   
'The moment you start to count the cost, is the moment you fail.' he thought to himself. 

Warlord Ugulhard was cutting through humans with his big battle-claw when he saw Commissar Yarrick. He'd heard from Grand Warlord Ghazghkull that Yarrick had been banished for contradicting his leader's orders. Ghazghkull had also said that the Red Deamon wanted the Yarrick for himself.   
'Wut da zog?' Ugulhard thought. 'I'ze will kill da Oomie now. Why does da Red Deamun want dat old Oomie for?'   
Ordering his driver to drive towards the old commissar, Ugulhard readied himself to disembark from the warbuggie. As he reached Yarrick, Ugulhard threw himself at the old man with a bestial roar. Sebastian, being not as quick as his grandfather, but quick none-the-less, ducked Ugulhard's first attack with ease. The battle-claw flew towards him five, six, seven times, Sebastian ducking it every time. But when the eighth swing came, Sebastian jumped to the left, but felt a cutting pain in his right arm.   
Ugulhard had caught his right arm by the elbow with the claw and cut it right off! The pneumatic claw had gone through bone and muscle like a hot knife through butter. Sebastian just stared at the stump that once had been his right arm; the blood was spurting out from the wound. When he saw the rest of his arm lying on the ground, the pain seemed to reach him finally.   
Screaming with pain, Sebastian went down on his knees, clutching his severed arm with his left hand. He heard Ugulhard's mad laughter and victory shout, as if the Ork had killed him. Yarrick couldn't believe it. This couldn't be true. It couldn't be true. It couldn't, wouldn't end like this. He'd always thought he'd die of age or in the field of battle, but not like this, not like this! The Iron Will of his family pumping in his veins together with the hatred he held towards anything alinged with Kharn, made it possible for him to shut out the pain. Grabbing hold of his chain-sword and staggering up to a standing position, fighting the shock and pain like no normal man, Sebastian Yarrick, Imperial Commissar and Warrior of the Emperor, looked Warlord Ugulhard in the eyes. The Ork looked shocked back at the old man. He thought he'd killed the human.   
"You can destroy our homes, you can murder our loved ones," Sebastian panted forth, putting the chain-sword in highest gear, making the motor scream as it pulled round the adamantium toothed chain. "But we'll defend our honour and homes no matter the cost! We will never forgive, never surrender!!"   
With that, Sebastian brought the chain-sword about in a wide, crimson arc, severing Ugulhard's bony, green head from his body. The head sneered at the old man for a moment until the creature's metabolism conceded he was dead.   
Sebastian breathed hard in and out a couple of times until he calmly reached down and loosened the battle-claw from Ugulhard's twitching body. It was hard with one arm, but he managed. As he was bent down when he loosened the straps of the claw, he didn't see the Thunderhawks landing behind the Imperial force. Pulling off the claw from Ugulhard's arm, straining every muscle in his old body to lift it, Sebastian showed the battle-claw to all the warriors present, Ork as human. The battlefield fell silent. Human and Ork as one gazed at the old man, standing on Ugulhard's body, holding a battle-claw a third of his height above his head. There was another moment of silence before the Ork horde fled; wailing in terror as they realized their leader had fallen. The human army attacked the Orks with renewed vigour and now finally Sebastian saw the Space Marines amongst them. As the Orks were beaten from Hades Hive, Sebastian Yarrick finally allowed himself to pass out. 

Charleston ran the fastest he could through the thick of humans. He sometimes flew short distances with his jump-pack. He had to find Sebastian, he knew the commissar in some way was behind the Orks so suddenly fleeing. The sudden silence he'd at first thought come because his force had arrived and surprised both HDF and Orks. But such wasn't the case. It had been Seb who'd caused the silence, but how.   
"Lieutenant Commander, over here!" a Space Marine Apothecary, the Marines equalient of a medic, called him.   
Charleston flew over to the apothecary with a few jumps and landed. What he saw he didn't want to believe. Ugulhard's beheaded corpse, Sebastian's right arm and Seb himself lying on top of Ugulhard's body. The claw had slipped out of his hand and was lying on the ground beside Ugulhard's body. The apothecary walked up to Sebastian's body and checked it. He put on a field dressing over the stump, to make it stop bleeding, but as he put his hand on the old man's chest, he pulled it back. Charleston wasn't watching, he was studying Ugulhard's claw and weighing it in his hands. Seb probably wanted to keep it. Charleston was still wearing the helmet from Temperstora that he'd nicked from the warboss. Sebastian liked trophies, but Charleston wasn't entirely sure that Sebastian wanted to be reminded of this. He decided to bring the claw with him so Seb could decide himself. "Sir?" the apothecary asked, holding his hand over Sebastian's face as thinking on putting it down.   
Charleston looked up from his thoughts. "What?" he asked.   
"Sir, Commissar Yarrick, he..." the apothecary hesitated. "He doesn't breathe."   
Charleston looked shocked at the apothecary. What had the man said?   
"He doesn't what?" Charleston said shocked, almost dropping the heavy claw on his feet.   
"Commissar Yarrick doesn't breathe, sir." the apothecary replied, a slight tone of sadness in his voice. 

~~~~~~To Be Continued~~~~~~~


	2. The Imperium regains control

Number of the ED - part 2

                             "And he gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon" 

                                                                                                                    Book of Revelations Ch. XVI v16

Hades Hive, 2 weeks after Ugulhard's death 

 When Charleston came into the hospital room, Sebastian was sitting up, regarding the plugs in his stump. Seb had been unconscious for three days after he'd lost his arm. When he'd woken up, Charleston had asked what Seb wanted to do with Ugulhard's battle-claw. Charleston had been shocked to hear that Seb wanted it fabricated into a prosthetic limb he could use instead of a normal bionic arm. The bio-meds had done as they'd been told and after a week of surgery, Seb was now implemented with the bionics needed to use the battle-claw as a weapon in battle. Seb was obviously not going to use his chain-sword again. 

 "How's the arm?" Charleston asked and sat down on a chair beside Sebastian's bed. 

 Sebastian looked up sharp from his daydreams. When he saw it was Charleston, he relaxed. 

 "It feels like it still is there, Ed." Sebastian replied and went back to studying his plugs. The scar tissue was raw and fresh and in places Seb still had stitches left, from where the surgeon had patched his arm, or what was left of it, back together. 

 "Doc said you'll be rid of the stitches in a few days. As for the phantom feeling, I dunno." 

 Sebastian suddenly laughed silently, and humourlessly, to himself. 

 "What?" Charleston asked. 

 "Isn't it just dumb luck that I'm left handed, Ed?" Sebastian said and looked at the marine. Charleston saw the twinkle in Seb's weary eyes, and understood. 

 "Yeah, or maybe it's fate." Charleston added. 

 "What have you got there, Ed?" Sebastian said and indicated the data-slates Charleston was carrying. 

 "Morning mail, commissar." Charleston replied with a smile as he handed Seb the first. He had opened it so Seb didn't have to meddle with that. 

 "The satellite surveillance system still works, even though we're in the middle of the Season of Shadows. We were able to pick up some few pictures, mainly over Helsreach and it surroundings, as there's no volcanic activity there, yet, should be added." 

 Sebastian hummed a reply as he looked at the photos in the pict-slate. Something approaching to Helsreach, something big... 

 "Ed, what is that big...blot, moving towards Helsreach Hive?" 

 Charleston said nothing, he just leaned forward, and touched a few zooming runes, and Seb now saw what the big blot was. Orks, hundreds of thousands of Orks. 

 "Ghazghkull..." Seb said quietly. 

 "Bingo. We don't know if there is Berzerkers coming the other way, or maybe even moving towards us, cause Mount Erestus blew a few days ago. Most of the northern part of Armageddon Secundus is covered in smoke. Nothing gets through." 

 "Have you sent signal to Helsreach about this?" 

 "Did it two days ago. I've got 100 men stationed there under the command of Captain Mikos. I ordered him to begin shuttle runs to evacuate the hive." 

 "Where are you sending the refugees?" 

 "Tartarus and Acheron. Hades is not going to be left alone after Ugulhard was beaten." 

 Charleston handed Sebastian the next data-slate. It was an ordinary text-slate, containing a roll of losses to the Berzerker/Orks combine. Sebastian felt very disheartened when he read through the list. So many lost? There was so many civilians, but also too many soldiers. 

 "When this is over Ed, remind me to shoot von Strab." Sebastian hissed. "1 million Guard, 74 Space Marine scouts, 316 Space Marines and an entire Titan Legion. Some billions of civilians. He's got enough blood on his hands to fill an ocean." 

 "Don't you think I'm aware of our losses? I would gladly go to Acheron and shoot von Strab myself, but it could very much demoralize the entire of Armageddon's population. I may be big, but I'm not stupid." 

 "On the contrary to our planetary governor." Sebastian muttered and snapped the data-slate shut. "What's in the third?" 

 "The numbers of the new hive defenders. It also contains some info on good officers. Officers and officers. Some have been bosses in the industry or even gang leaders. The gang leaders are very good fighters and most have a very good tactical knowledge. They'll be great!" 

 "I believe so." Sebastian said absentmindedly as he read it through. "What about Colonel Archer? Is he up to it?" 

 "He's almost recovered now, though he needed a pair of bionic hands, as his biological are gone. He's fine now. He volunteered to command some hive militia. He said he 'wanted to act under competent command'." 

 "I'm flattered." Sebastian said and got out of the bed. 

 "Where do you think you're going, mister?" Charleston said. "Doc's orders are 'Stay in bed'." 

 "The new militia has to see who's commanding them, and I wanted to share some of my knowledge with them before their first drill with lasguns." 

 "You should still stay in bed. You need rest." 

 "Maybe, but sooner or later, I'll rest anyway. Forever." 

 Charleston recognized the macabre in the comment and swallowed hard. Seb didn't think he was going to survive this war. A tunic hitting him in his face brought Ed from his thoughts. As he pulled it off his face, Charleston saw it was Seb's black dress jacket. Seb was standing before him, dressed in breeches and undershirt. The jackboots were standing by the chair where Sebastian's greatcoat and cap was slung, together with his holster and Ordo Imperialis. 

 "Please help me with it, it's impossible with only one arm." Sebastian said and turned round and stretched out his arms, making him look as a man crucified, without a cross. Charleston pulled on Seb his tunic and helped the old man button it. He then, under Sebastian's instructions, tied the Ordo Imperialis around Sebastian's waist, after putting on the holster. The greatcoat was a bit tricky, with an empty sleeve being pulled into another but they managed. Seb left the greatcoat unbuttoned and pulled on his cap while Charleston put on his jackboots as carefully as he could. 

Eventually, Seb was dressed and ready to go. Charleston followed him to the training grounds, but there he left the commissar, as Charleston had other things to attend to. 

 After making a quick check in the tech-shop, to see if his new 'arm' was coming along, Sebastian proceeded to a part of the Middle hive that was currently being used as training grounds and bivouac for the scratch companies. Many 'soldiers' looked up as Sebastian passed by. Some whispered things and pointed towards his empty sleeve. A few, most probably ex-guardsmen stood up and saluted him. Sebastian answered every salute he received. When he got to the end of the line of tents he'd passed, he stopped, and turned round and faced what had been appointed Scratch Company Morpheus Alfa. 

 "Men and women of Hades Hive Defence Militia, Morpheus Alfa!" Sebastian shouted out with astoundingly clear voice, considering his age. Everyone in Morpheus Alfa turned his or her attention to the commissar now. "I am here to supervise your first firing drill personally! Get lasguns and power packs and I'll see you at the rifle range in five minutes! I expect you all to be there!" 

 The nearly three hundred men and women of Morpheus Alfa started milling around to get their gear and Sebastian walked off towards the rifle range. 

As he walked, a man came running up to him. It was Colonel Archer. Archer was tall, around two metres, but built slimly, just like Sebastian and most people of Armageddon who weren't of the noble houses. Sebastian immediately felt that Archer wasn't some officer given his rank because his father was a general. No, there was an air around Archer saying that the fifty year old or so man had grown up amongst ordinary Hivers. He'd worked hard for his rank, Sebastian understood. Archer was still wearing his uniform from the Steel Legion, though the regimental badge and the rank pins had been removed. Archer's hands had been cut off, there were still marks of blood on the sleeves of his greatcoat, and he wasn't wearing any gauntlets like most officers of the Steel Legions did. He wasn't even wearing the helmet or the gas mask. 

 "Been degraded, Charlie?" Sebastian said to ease the tension that was in the air. 

 "What? No, it's just that there's nothing left of my regiment to be spoken of. I think I'm the only survivor." Archer replied, disheartened. "We should have listened to you, Commissar. We should all have listened to you from the beginning." 

 "It's easy to be wise in retrospect." Sebastian replied coldly, remembering the tactical 'council' he'd been invited to and then ignored. 

 "I mean it, Yarrick!" Archer cried out, a tad of panic in his voice. Or was it fear, Sebastian wasn't sure. "We didn't understand the knowledge you hold. If you'd been your grandfather, we'd all listened. No one would question his authority. But you, you're just..." 

 "I'm just a Commissar!" Sebastian snapped Archer off. "Listen here, colonel! I don't want any half-hearted excuses. You all ignored me because you feared von Strab. You feared contradicting the orders of an imbecile! That's what you feared, not the enemy, right?" 

 Although Archer was far stronger than Yarrick, he felt something inside him, lingering like a cancer. It was the fear of losing his life. 

 "And all this stuff about my grand-father!" Yarrick went on. "Forget him!! He's dead and buried! I'm the one carrying our legacy now! I promised him to remember everything I'd learned about Berzerkers and their tactics, and when it's finally needed, you ignore me, because I'm not 'like my grand-father'!" 

 Sebastian grabbed Archer by the collar and brought the colonel down eye to eye with him. Archer couldn't afterwards remember if what he'd seen was true. He'd thought he'd seen tears in the corners of Sebastian Yarrick's eyes. And still, the old man seemed boiling with anger.

 "I represent the Imperial Commissariat on Armageddon, and I'll be damned if I can't represent the Yarrick family also!" Sebastian growled at Archer. 

"I saved this Hive a few weeks ago. Hell, I saved it when I arrived here. The smartest decision von Strab has done throughout this war has been sending me here. So don't come with excuses of me being here or you not listening, colonel. They don't do anything now, anyways. Right?" 

 With that, Sebastian left Archer and walked off to the rifle range. Sebastian had built up a good deal of steam to blow over the last months, as he'd grown more and more agitated about the officers in charge of Armageddon's forces. Sebastian nearly hated them for not lifting a finger against von Strab's insane decisions. And what the frekk did Holt think he was doing? Nothing, Sebastian concluded to himself. The bastard was doing nothing to stop von Strab's actions. Holt was for Saint Armagon's sake a commissar, why wasn't he acting? 

 Seb found himself at the rifle range when he came back from his thoughts. Much was happening right now, but he had to concentrate on the task at hand: To teach some habbers who hadn't even held in a lasgun before how to fire it as accurately as any Guard veteran. Sebastian had a few days to this on. 

 The rifle range was a big, open space on about 100,000 square metres. There was enough room here for seven hundred men and women to have a firing drill at the same time. One very long row of firing-stands and about 200 metres away from the stands were the target plates. The target plates had, in Sebastian's own opinion, got a very unlucky placement. He'd wanted to change places between the stands and the targets, but it had came out that one of the noble houses of Hades Hive had apparently used it as a warehouse for goods, like food stuffs and clothing, and with so many 'Underhivers' there, they weren't sure if their precious ownings and wares would still be there after the firing-drill. Sebastian had said he'd understood but in his thoughts he'd cursed the nobles for their greed. The reason the targets were badly placed was because that along certain parts of the warehouse wall, electrical cords ran, some were even of the high voltage kind. This created electromagnetic fields at places, which made it impossible to scan the building, which Seb thought was the original intention, but it also had a dangerous effect when laser hit it. Some of these electromagnetic fields ran right behind some targets, which meant that if someone missed the target, which they undoubtly would do, they would get a nasty ricochet singing towards them. Lasguns never got ricochets, unless the shot hit an electromagnetic field. 

 When the five minutes had passed, Seb looked to see if everyone had arrived. They all had and this in fact impressed Sebastian. Not even well drilled Guardsmen always made it on the time the sergeants and commissars ordered them to perform their orders, but the habbers seemed to have some inner force driving them. Sebastian knew what it was. They fought for their homes and lives and loved ones, not just the Emperor. They had so much more to win on this than the Guard had. Sebastian decided to appraise them before they started. 

 "My fellow hivers, you'd undoubtly already had a run-through on how a lasgun works and how to clean it. Today, warriors of Morpheus Alfa, you'll have your first firing drill with the weapon used by Guardsmen, and women for that part, every day across the Imperium. It's versatile and rugged. Simple yet complex. It can be used as anything ranging from a sniper rifle to a machine gun. It can, depending on the power setting, be used as either a stun gun or as a weapon killing with each shot. But still, this would all be nothing if you can't use it properly. In the hands of a competent marksman, this weapon could rival the Exitus Rifles of the Vindicare Assassins. In the hands of a brave Guardsman, with a good training, it can be as deadly as a bolt gun. This, my friends, is why you're here today. You'll learn how to fire a lasgun, at different power settings, at different fire rates. Still, there's one thing I want you to have clear for yourselves. You're not Space Marines. You're no super humans. If you fire badly compared to a Space Marine, remember, their eyes are ten times better than yours. But for that we're not worthless. The Marines of the Adeptus Astartes Legio Mortes Angelicus, the Death Angels in Low-gothic, puts a great trust in the inhabitants of Hades Hive. Their commander, Lieutenant Commander Charleston has told me that without the help from the Hadesians, they'd be lost. Let that serve as proof that we are more important than the Marines of the Adeptus Astartes, you are more worth than the nobles not lifting a finger to help you in these dire times!" 

 This last remark caused cheers and applauses in the crowd. Sebastian was aware how important it was to keep the morale up amongst people, especially civilians, in wars. It was true though. Most noble houses hadn't done a thing to help in the defence of Hades Hive. House Artis was one possible exception, but otherwise it had been the minor houses and the merchant families who's helped the most. And of course the habbers themselves. Sebastian hoped they knew how proud he was of them. Men, and women, taking up arms to protect their homes. It brought some hope to him that the most were prepared to sell their lives dearly. Losses would be big, big indeed. 

 "One last thing, before you start out on full-power, single-shot." Sebastian said, raising his hand. "I would rather have had the targets here, and you over there where the targets are. But there are high voltage cords running along the wall behind the targets. This, my friends, causes an electromagnetic field to form. Now, las shots are quite nasty when they hit electromagnetic fields, as they ricochet, without dropping speed or power. I know las shots aren't supposed to ricochet, but I know this of old. Begin!" 

 The static feel and the uncanny cracking of lasgun fire filled the air. Sebastian started to walk down the line of three hundred slowly, stopping at some people, giving them some advise or correcting their aim. At some, he just stopped and stared as they got bull's eye on bull's eye. There were at least five very skilled snipers in Morpheus Alpha, and many more who could rival the Guard snipers. Sebastian had almost walked down the entire line when he heard a curse. Sebastian turned quickly, fearing the worst, and felt something hot burn across his left eye. 

 Dropping to his knees, holding his good hand over his left eye, Sebastian understood far too well what had happened. A ricochet had hit him. 

The soldier who'd uttered the curse hadn't been hit, he'd known he'd missed and Sebastian had turned in time to receive the las shot in his left eye. 

 "Sir, I'm so sorry," the soldier said as he sat down beside Sebastian. "It was a mistake, I promise. Medic!...Commissar Yarrick?" 

 Sebastian removed his hand from his face and looked at the trooper with his one good eye. There was a long moment of silence before Sebastian broke it. 

 "I understand it was a mistake," Sebastian said softly. "Another commissar might not have, but I do. How does it look?" 

 "Bad." the soldier replied simply. Sebastian saw in the man's eyes how bad he regretted this. Sebastian didn't want to believe it himself. Las wounds were tricky, Sebastian knew. There was just a split second of stinging pain, the wounds fusing together skin and there was almost always no blood. But Yarrick understood what bad meant. It meant there was blood, and Sebastian could in fact feel it running down his face. There was no pain right now, but it would come. Yarrick knew it. Instead of waiting on the medic, Sebastian got up and walked away towards the hospital where he'd spent the last two weeks. No one tried to stop him as he walked there. No one dared to stop the old commissar whose left eye was just a bloody mess. 

 In his mind, Sebastian knew with what he would replace his eye with. A special bionic implant. The Orks already feared him, Ed had told him that, so Seb knew how to terrify them even more. He was, after all, considered an expert on the Ork mind. The Orks, when seeing Warlord Ugulhard killed by an old human with one arm, said that he couldn't be killed. That he was death to any Ork. And that in two weeks. It would be fun to see their reactions at his new eye. 

 Sebastian savoured his thoughts of this until he was sedated so that the tech-medics could build in the bionic eye into his cranium. A bionic eye which projected a pulse of laser-light at mental command. 

Helsreach Hive, 3 weeks after Ugulhard's death

 Helsreach had plenty of time to evacuate. Still millions of habbers decided to stay. How they regretted that, probably, when the Orkish psyker attack came. That was five days ago. Most people had died when it came. They had either been killed by the psychic storm created by the hundreds of 

Orkoid psykers, or driven insane by the visions that came afterwards or the sights of their dead friends and family. On some, the heads exploded. 

Crane-drivers in the harbour of Helsreach welded themselves into the huge cranes they used to drive. There, they made a last stand against the savage Ork horde led by Warlord Ghazghkull Thraka. A last stand that would go into the history of Armageddon as one of the most heroic feats ever. The Roll of Honour of the many martyrs of Helsreach would be long. 

 Commissar Ishmael Grisham knew that it was inevitable that he would end up on that roll, but he would make an exit that would make deep boot prints in the history of Armageddon. For the last five days, Ishmael and a tiny group of Helsreachians, about fifty men and women, had conducted guerrilla warfare against the Orks. The Orks were constantly searching for survivors, those capable enough were used as slaves, those who weren't, were killed. Ishmael didn't like this. Food and water was scarce. He had himself not drunken anything for 12 hours, and he was beginning to feel the strain. As soon as his group found a scrap of food or some water, he gave it to the civilians. They were looking up to him now; they saw him as their protector. He was a commissar, Emperor damn it, and he wasn't going to let these people down. 

 That had been his thoughts four hours ago. One hour ago, Ork so-called Kommandos, Orks who were very good at infiltration and guerrilla warfare, had discovered his group. In half an hour, 30 of Ishmael's group had been killed. That had been those unarmed and unarmoured. Ishmael and the 20 remaining put up a stalwart defence. Ten minutes ago, though it seemed like an eternity, the group had been reduced to ten men, including IG. 

 The Ork Kommandos were crumbling away. 'Maybe there's a chance that we'll survive until tomorrow.' Ishmael thought to himself as he put a perfect shot with his laspistol between the eyes of an Ork. 

 Ghazghkull Thraka, Ork warlord, jumped out of his war truck, a 7 metres long, red-painted, open-topped truck. Beside the driver in the front, an 

Orkish try at a plasma cannon was mounted, manned by a gunner. The platform at the back was big enough to fit in both huge Ghazghkull and his bodyguard of mega-armoured Orks. As Ghazghkull jumped out of the truck, his bodyguard and truck-crew held on for dear life as the truck wobbled when the nearly one and a half-tonne heavy Ork jumped out. 

 Landing hard on the ground, making half a metre deep boot prints in the asphalt, Ghazghkull walked off towards where Big Boss Uzbex was waiting. 

Uzbex had called the warlord concerning some puny humans putting up hard resistance. They didn't want to get caught and made slaves. For some odd reason, humans didn't want to be slaves as easily as gretchin, or grots as Orks called them. Ghazghkull couldn't believe Uzbex couldn't even take care of some stray humans. "How da zog did Uzbex make Big boss?" Ghazghkull thought to himself as he approached the other Ork commander. 

 "Good dat yoo could cum boss," Uzbex said and made a clumsy salute. Uzbex was only armoured in pieces of plasteel he'd torn of Land Speeders and fashioned into armour. Under that, he wore simple combat fatigues (for Orks) and a commissar's greatcoat. The sleeves had been torn off so Uzbex could put it on, but otherwise it was largely intact. On his head, he had one of the many peaked caps he'd collected over the years. On Uzbex' feet was the powerful boots all Orks used and knew how to make. Uzbex happened to be made of Squiggoth-skin. 

 "Wot's yer problem Uzbex?" Ghazghkull growled. He'd had fun executing the stout humans that ruled this metal-city when Uzbex informed him. Executing, Ghazghkull saw it more as target practice. 

 "Dere's a skwad of Oomies down dere wot won't give up!" Uzbex said and pointed towards a part of the giant plaza. Ghazghkull heard shouts and screams, both human and Orkish. Under all the screaming, Ghazghkull make out something else. It was what the humans called a battle-psalm. Only one type of human sung those songs; commissars. 

 "Dey've got a commissurr amongst dem," Ghazghkull said simply as he and Uzbex walked towards the part of the plaza the fighting was taking place in. They stopped behind a massive pillar and looked at the bloodbath before them. Seven human soldiers and a commissar, fighting like possessed against the Orks. Under the disciplined command of a commissar, humans didn't give up, Ghazghkull had learned. He also knew the effect of taking away the leaders of the enemy force. As Ghazghkull thought on this, one Ork warrior got to close to the commissar. With a backhand punch of his left hand, the commissar smashed the skull of the Ork to pulp. This was repeated on three other Orks. Still, the man seemed old, his hair white and his body shrunken of age. Uzbex stood twice as tall as the commissar, Ghazghkull realized. Still such courage, such stamina! Ghazghkull almost admired the old man fighting for his cause. An impossible cause, though. Something in Ghazghkull's mind flickered, a memory. He couldn't put his green, massive finger on what, but the human seemed familiar. Where had he seen the human before? As the commissar jumped down and moved carefully, as if careful not to break anything, Ghazghkull finally put two and two together. The bionic arm, the broken back, the very looks of the man! It was the commissar from back on Gideon! So, the human was still alive? 

 "Pull back da soljers, Uzbex." Ghazghkull snapped. 

 "Wot?" 

 "Get dem away from da Oomies!" Ghazghkull roared. 

 Uzbex ordered the Orks to fall back and regroup where he and Ghazghkull were standing. As the Orks ran from the humans, some were shot down by the las-fire of the humans. As the Ork warriors regrouped at fifty metres distance of the humans, the human fire seized. Ghazghkull smiled. Soon, the indoctrinated commissar would emerge to lead a charge, and play right into his hands. 

 "Uzbex," Ghazghkull said as softly as he could. "Would ya like a new hat to yer collektion?" 

 Uzbex nodded his reply. He understood the plan. Ghazghkull sauntered off towards his truck; he had other business to attend to. Some more target practice. 

 Back at the corner of the plaza, Uzbex kneeled down and aimed his big shoota steadily and waited. The big sub-machine gun had been heavy for any ordinary Ork, but Uzbex was a Big Boss, a leader and thus bigger than most Orks. 

 "Do you think they've gone, commissar?" a soldier asked IG. The man couldn't have been more than twenty-five. 

 "No, they haven't," IG replied curtly. "They may be Orks, but they're not stupid." Ishmael thought about the big mega-armoured warrior he'd seen. There was no mistaking it was the same Ork that he'd encountered on Gideon. The same Ork that had broken his back ten years ago. Maybe he was going to get revenge for that now? Ishmael wasn't going to act stupidly now. The Orks most probably thought that they were going to make a counter-attack, but IG knew that it was pure suicide. They had to attract the Orks attention in some way, but how? 

 Pulling off his dog tags and handing them to the nearest trooper, Ishmael got ready to leap up. 

 "Give these to Commissar Yarrick, if you get out of here. He'll understand." IG said and fixed his peaked cap into place. 

 "Sir, don't tell me that you're going to..." the soldier said with a dismal tone in his voice. 

 "I'm an old man, boy. I most surely won't survive anyway. You run from here as fast as you can, find a shuttle and get out of here!" 

 "What are you going to do?" the soldier asked as he and the others got ready to leave. 

 "Me? I'll distract them long enough for you to run, what else?" Ishmael said with a shrug. 

 The soldier nodded simply. "May Saint Armagon be with you, Commissar Grisham." 

 "You too." IG responded and leapt over the lip of the crater they'd been crouching in. 

 As IG got over the top and over on the other side, he screamed at the top of his voice "For the Emperor of Humanity, in all Eternity!" 

 This move was so sudden that the Orks on instinct ran forward. IG saw to his dismay that the Ork Warlord had gone. As the Ork warriors attacked him, he felled them with well-placed shot from his laspistol or he broke their neck with deft swings and chops of his bionic arm. He felt like a god, not even being touched, until one Ork came up from behind and gave IG a powerful punch in the back. High on adrenaline, Ishmael could shut out most of the pain as he heard a horrible crack on the inside. Spinning round, ignoring the immense pain and going on adrenaline alone, Ishmael punched a fist-sized hole in the forehead of the Ork behind him. Seeing that the Orks had been beaten, Ishmael sagged down onto his knees, the pain of his broken back reaching to him like an avalanche. Tears streaked his wrinkled face as he tried to shut out the pain and a thick darkness was beginning to surround him. He barely realized the red laser-point searching its way up from his abdomen up to his chest. He did, however, see the big Ork dressed in a commissar's uniform, or what was left of it. The beast was smiling and it uttered something IG couldn't make out what it was. The smile went over into a deep, growling and despicably evil laughter. IG understood. He understood perfectly what was going to happen. 

 "Bastard," Ishmael mumbled with his last powers. "May you burn in hell." A split second later, the huge gun in the Ork's hands erupted into explosive life and, though barely conscious, Ishmael Grisham, Imperial Commissar, felt how his chest was blown open and his back broken on yet another place. 

Two seconds later, he was dead. He never saw how the Ork picked off his cap and added it to a collection of other commissar caps, dangling like trophies from the Ork's belt. He also never saw the monument raised in the plaza of Helsreach over his sacrifice and all the other men and women who gave their lives in defence of Helsreach. The plaza, should be noted, was renamed Grisham's Plaza and each street going from it, around 47 streets, were named after the men and women who died here in service of the Emperor on this day. 

Hades Hive, one day after Helsreach's fall 

 "Commissar Grisham wanted you to have these," the soldier said and handed Sebastian the dog tags. "He said you'd understand." 

 "Yes," Sebastian replied in a voice full of sorrow. "Yes, I understand. And now Helsreach has fallen." 

 "Yes, what I know, we were some of the few to survive, sir. We took one of the last shuttles." 

 The soldier saw how Commissar Yarrick's bionic eye blazed with inner fire. The old man was still looking at the dog tags in his left hand. Yarrick had no right underarm any more. At final, after a long moment of silence, Sebastian looked up at the soldier. 

 "Do me a favour young man. Go to Hive-monitor Artis and tell him to issue one hour of silence in memory to Helsreach's loss and billions of lives in it." 

 "Yes, sir!" the soldier said, saluted and walked off. 

 Sebastian was at Level Top 60 of Hades Hive. There was an old Imperial Chapel not far from where he was. Deciding to go there, Sebastian put the dog tags into his coat pocket. He needed some time to himself. Charleston was supervising the defence turrets, so he wouldn't bother him. 

 When Sebastian came into the chapel, he ordered the preacher and the missionaries out of the chapel. 

 "Isn't it anything that we can do for you, commissar?" the paunchy preacher had asked. "A low song of lament, anything?" 

 "Just leave me alone!" Sebastian had roared, his voice broken with sorrow. The preacher had then left the chapel, he and his missionaries closing the huge oak door behind them. As they closed the door, some of the missionaries said he'd be drawing fresh inspiration from the God-Emperor. The preacher knew better. He knew Yarrick was just one man, an old man. Things can get too much even for a veteran like him. 

 And the preacher was right. As Sebastian was left alone, he sagged down before the altar of the Emperor, clutching the dog tags of his old friend in his hand. 

 "It can't be true, please, God-Emperor, don't let it be," he mumbled under his breath. But Sebastian knew it wasn't. Tears began streaking his old, lined and wrinkled face. Tears of both pain, sorrow and shame. The pain Sebastian had gone through the last few weeks should have killed a normal man, his sorrow would have driven anyone else mad. And his shame... He was ashamed that he couldn't live up to the demands put on him, as a commissar. He had failed in his service to the Emperor, his loyalty to his best friend and his promise to his grandfather. Sebastian raised his head to look up into the roof and screamed out his sorrow and pain. As he lowered his head, he mumbled to himself "What sort of commissar am I? I can't even help my best friend when he needs me, I can't even keep a promise!" Sebastian's right face-half was wet with tears now. He didn't cry any more with his left. He couldn't. But what did that matter now? With Helsreach gone, the water supplies would in the end run out. And the Season of Storms was approaching. What could he, Sebastian Yarrick, do? He was just one man...just one man...

 A hollow sound behind him, made him start up and look around. Sebastian knocked the feeling away. It was the delusions of an old man. Just delusions. When he heard the sound the second time, Sebastian stood up and scanned the chamber with his bionic eye's heat-scan. No readings. 

 "You can't see me on that." a hollow voice said behind him. Sebastian spun round and stared into the face of his grandfather. Or the face of the ghost of his grandfather. Screaming, Sebastian fell backwards, forgetting the staired altar and landed on his back on the floor. Crawling backwards, 

Sebastian tried to distance himself from the apparition. He had never been so scared. His grandfather had finally come to exact his vengeance on Seb for his folly. For his cowardice. 

 "Sebastian," the apparition called. "Don't be afraid, I'm not here to harm you." 

 Sebastian calmed down, a little. The apparition looked at him for a long moment until it said something new. 

 "What has happened with you? You look like you've been through hell and back." 

 Sebastian smiled sadly to himself. It had to be his grandfather, all right. A ghost, maybe, but still his grandfather. Same sick sort of humour. 

 "Really lame, gramps!" Sebastian said and sat up. "Or what are you really? You can't be a ghost, they only haunt the places they died on." 

 "That's right. I'm a memory, you can say." the apparition said and drifted closer. It looked exactly as Commissar-general Rolf Yarrick, just semi-transparent and grey, but still dressed in the uniform. 

 "Why now, why here?" Sebastian said silently, his voice still having streak of sorrow in it. 

 "I don't think the Emperor had time..." the apparition said with a smile. "You've lost hope, Sebastian." 

 Sebastian looked up, straight into the dead eyes of the ghost. "That's true. I've lost hope. My best friend is dead! Of Armageddon's eight major 

Hives, five belong to the enemy now! All is lost..." 

 A chilling feeling passed through Sebastian's body. It had felt as walking through an ice-cold waterfall. It took Sebastian some time to realize that the apparition had tried to slap him, but instead passed right through his face with its hand. 

 "First fault as a commissar, Sebastian!" the ghost shouted in its hollow voice. Rolf Yarrick's usually comical dialect didn't sound funny at all. 

"Never lose hope. To lose hope is to blaspheme against the Emperor! It's another step on the path of damnination!" 

 "But we are cornered, what can I do?" Sebastian asked and stood up again. "What can I possibly do?" 

 The apparition drifted closer and put its hands on Sebastian's cheeks. The chilly feeling was gone. This touch was gentle and warm and Sebastian looked up into the eyes of his grandfather. 

 "Remember when you asked about how commissars came to be?" he said softly, the voice sounding less hollow. 

 "Yes, they were the police-officers of the planet Moskva." Sebastian replied automatically. 

 "Remember their leader, Mikhail Mischkjin? He took care of ten families of common workers. He organized all the People Commissars into a force that one day assaulted the Government Council and executed each and every member of the Political Commissar order, as they'd become as corrupt as the other politicians. Most politicos of that council were executed. Mischkjin created a new council, and the council was always watched at its meetings by a People Commissar, or simply Commissars, as they became known. He established our creeds and working orders which we follow today." 

 "And when the desertions of Imperial Guard increased, the Committerea Imperius was established and Commissars trained for use in the Imperium. 

I know that." Sebastian said quietly. "But what happened to Mischkjin?" 

 "Mischkjin died of a rare cancer disease in his heart at barely 55 years of age, he never got to see how the Imperial Commissariat was born. But we celebrate him none-the-less as our founder." 

 "And the morale is..." Sebastian queried. 

 "Mischkjin never lost hope, not even when he faced off against five gangsters alone. He never gave up, never lost hope. And that has become one of the corner stones for a commissar. Never give up in the face of the enemy, it's a blasphemy. Never lose hope, as long as there's life, there's hope. 

Haven't you proved that already? You defeated Ugulhard single-handedly. What did you use as driving force?" 

 This was a question, Sebastian heard it well. 

 "My faith in the Emperor. My promise to you. And my iron will in victory." Seb replied. 

 "And that iron will comes from...?" 

 "A hope. A hope in life." Sebastian complemented perfectly. There was no longer any doubt in his mind. He would save Hades Hive from the Orks, if it so killed him! He wouldn't let it fall into the hands of his most hated enemy, Kharn! 

 Sebastian picked up his peaked cap by the altar and moved to walk out of the chapel. The hour of mourning had almost passed. He would walk out and show Kharn once and for all that he had bitten of way more than the Chaos Lord could chew. As he got to the port, the apparition called him a final time. 

 "For the Emperor, Sebastian, in deed and mind..." 

 "I don't need that anymore, gramps." Sebastian replied, a small smile forming on his lips. "My new motto is going to be 'Iron Will, Iron Fist'!" 

 "Why, Sebastian?" 

 "I have a small surprise for the Orks." Sebastian said and smiled as he rubbed his right arm stump. With that, Sebastian left the chapel. A historical note should be made here. Commissar Sebastian Yarrick never revealed what had happened in Chapel 03/ac of Top Level60. It was a secret he was going to have with himself to the grave. Only one other person ever found out. Master Lexicanum McKenzie, but that was all that Sebastian told him of the Armageddon War. 

Hades Hive, 2 weeks after fall of Helsreach 

 Days passed, weeks passed. Ghazghkull threw everything he could at Hades Hive after he'd conquered Helsreach. Each and everyday had it's new battle. Ghazghkull soon gave up in trying to conquer the hive by sheer force, and went over in trying every sneaky tactic the Gork and Mork (the Orkish gods) had taught him. He tried to infiltrate the hive with Ork Kommandos, he built huge battering ram Gargants, but Yarrick and the Hadesians staved them all off. Against the Gargants, Sebastian ordered each and every weapon more powerful than a missile launcher to fire at the huge war machines, and against the Kommandos, Seb found men who knew the ventilation system like their own pockets and sent them out into the system, stripped nearly naked and armed with bolt pistol and power sword to combat the Orks. Not a single Kommando emerged alive. But these tactics were only few amongst many Ghazghkull tried, and still, none of the two commanders had truly met. Ghazghkull only knew he was fighting one tough nut of a human, while Sebastian didn't know the true size of Ghazghkull (physically). He wasn't sure that he was facing the Ork Warlord of Gideon. 

 After one fierce attack by the Orks, which ended in a retreat across River Euminides for the Orks, Yarrick and Charleston decided to take a look outside, to see what the landscape looked like. And to get a few hours off from their Hive life. 

 Sebastian threw off the gasmask as soon as they'd gotten out of range of the ash wastes. There was breathable air on Armageddon, but it certainly wasn't in the ash wastes. There was one such place just a few hundred kilometres from Hades, and that was where he and Charleston was right now. 

Charleston had almost been driving Sebastian nuts the last two hours by singing 'Walking Across River Euminide' by Fred Hartmann, but it was also nice be able to breathe air that wasn't filtered. They'd though on finding any stray Orks out there, but there had been nothing in the wastes. 

 Ed was still humming! 

 "Ed!" Sebastian growled. "For saint Armagon's sake, shut up!" 

 "Sorry, Sebastian, just can't get that song outta my head." Charleston replied meekly. 

 "Just be quiet, I'm trying to think." Seb fell quiet for a while. "Hey, what actually happened to Hartmann? He just disappeared from show biz." 

 "What I heard, he was killed by three sisters for insulting their family." 

 (Author's Note: The Euminides were the three sisters of Revenge in Greek mythology.) 

 "I've had enough of the wastes, let's go home..." Sebastian said and started to walk, without looking where he was setting down his foot. He disappeared in a cloud of dust and he fell headlong to the ground. Charleston just stood were he was, just as surprised as Sebastian had been. 

 Sebastian coughed and dusted of his greatcoat best he could. After a moment of coughing and violently cursing, Yarrick stood up and looked at 

Ed. Charleston simply looked back at the old man. 

 "I've never heard so many curses. Had no idea there were so many in the Low Gothic language, Seb." Charleston said and chuckled. 

 "I know, that's why I threw in a few on High Gothic, Callidussian and Armageddon slang tongue." Seb said as he got out of the hole. 

 "That is a weird place to place a hole in. In the middle of the road...or whatever you can call this." Sebastian said with a gesture. 

 Charleston didn't reply immediately. Instead he was quiet for a long moment, studying the hole. 

 "That isn't a hole, Sebastian." 

 "Then what is it?" 

 "A boot print...a frekking big boot prints." 

 "A boot print?" Sebastian echoed and looked at Charleston and then at the 'hole'. "But somebody, or something with that large feet must be at least five metres tall..." Seb's voice trailed off. He looked down at the boot print again. "And at least weigh like a Dreadnought walker..." he silently added. 

 "Ghazghkull." Charleston said simply. "It has to be him." 

 There was a long pause of silence. The only thing heard was the howling wind, as it blew up sand to a storm in the far horizon. Charleston broke the silence. "There are prints beside Ghazghkull's." 

"And whom do you think they belong to, my dear Charleston?" Sebastian said and cocked an eyebrow. 

 "Kharn." the big Space Marine replied. 

 Sebastian jaw dropped, nearly. Kharn had been here, but how did Charleston know? 

 "How come you're so sure it's Kharn?" Sebastian asked quietly. He'd been so taken aback by the fact that Kharn had been so close, that most of the air had gone out of him. 

 "Dunno, but I don't think Orks have Marine boots." 

 "Most probably so..." Sebastian said and looked around. They were standing in the middle of a crater, blown out by a meteorite the probably struck all those months ago at the Day of the Feast. Something didn't seem right though. Those rocks over there were a bit too even to be rocks. 

 Seb realized to his horror they weren't rocks! 

 "Ed, we'd better get our butts out of here, quick!" Sebastian said and made a sign to move out to the Steel Legionnaires that had followed them. 

 "Why so?" Charleston replied. Seb thought it impossible that this man had just acted detective, and now he missed some very crucial details. 

 "ED!" Sebastian hissed. "We're standing in the middle of the nest of a sand-cob..." Seb didn't get any further until the ground rumbled alarmingly and a 50 metres long sand-cobra shot out of the ground. The huge serpent, most probably a female because of its small neck shield, was hissing dangerously at the two men that had gotten too close to her eggs. The cobra dived down with speed like a lightning bolt, but Seb and Charleston ducked away just in time. They both hid behind a huge rock that wasn't an egg and caught their breaths. Charleston saw that Sebastian was white in his face with fear. He couldn't blame the old man for being scared. Ed had encountered sand-cobras two-times before, but none of this size. 

Something went up to him. Eddie had claimed to have killed a sand-cobra at 30 metres once, he even had the skull. If he, Ed, could manage to kill this beast, he'd prove himself a better warrior than the grand commander himself. Charleston drew his power sword. 

 "Ed, you're not seriously considering going one-on-one with that monster, are you?" Sebastian said, his voice shaky of fear. If there was one thing faith in the Emperor couldn't save him from it was the teeth of a sand-cobra. And this sucker's teeth were about the size of Sebastian. At least the fangs. 

 "I'm gonna kill it and take it's head as a trophy, that's what I'm gonna do!" Charleston said and turned on his jump pack and flew off. 

 "ED!! NOOO!" Sebastian screamed after the lieutenant commander, but it was no use. Charleston had made up his mind. "That nut has to be nuts!" 

Sebastian mumbled to himself. 

 Up in the air, Charleston ducked for the sand-cobra's attacks. Even though the serpent was huge, it was quick, unnaturally quick. But Ed was quicker as the suit of power armour he was wearing had heightened his reflexes. Sebastian watched in horror as Charleston was nearly missed by the whip-like tail. One punch from that tail would break anyone's back, Seb was certain. A crackling in his ear, woke him from his daily nightmare. It had been the lieutenant of the Steel Legionnaires calling him over the short-range vox-system. The officer had wondered if they should engage the giant wyrm. 

 "Are you crazy?" Sebastian had spat back. "That thing could swallow a man whole! No, let Charleston finish this himself, which I hope he can." 

 The tail barely missed again, and Charleston had felt the wind rushing through his close-cut hair. It had been close, too frekking close! He had to get out of the way of the damned tail. A few quick manoeuvres and dodges and he were face to face with the snake. The creature reacted instantly and attacked Charleston full on with its maw. Charleston dodged it nimbly. But it was once again very close. 

 "Strike one!" Charleston shouted. 

 The snake struck at him with its tail once again. The horn-barbed tail scratched at Charleston's leg armour, leaving three, inch deep scars in the right leg's armour. He had to get the tail out of the way! 

 "Strike two!" Charleston said and dodged away to the face of the wyrm. 

 The snake didn't attack like before, instead it tested a new manoeuvre. It stopped almost in front of Charleston and sent out it's snapping tongue at him. The tongue took a big chunk of ceramite with it as it loosened itself from Charleston's chest plate. After retaining it's tongue, it made yet another fly on attack. 

 "Strike three! You're OUT!" Charleston screamed as he went up at the right side of the serpent's face. Charleston very seldom fought according to the Codex: Adeptus Astartes, although he should. But on one point he and the Codex agreed; when facing an Armageddon sand-cobra, armed with only one sword, you can only do one thing and you only get one chance, so time it PERFECTLY! 

 "I said: You're OUT! O-W-T! OUT! You frekking son of a..." Charleston cursed as he loaded up for the thrust. He had to time it perfectly, only one chance. If he missed, he probably would lose his power sword too. Two, three, four dodging manoeuvres, and then the opportunity were given. 

 "Die evil wyrm of Hell!!" Charleston shouted at the top of his lungs as he ran the gleaming blue sword through the right eye of the cobra. His goal was to pierce the brain of the creature, but it had a brain the size of a football and a cranium the size of Charleston, so it would all be hanging on luck now. Charleston flew away a few hundred metres, as not to be in the way of the thing, unarmed, if he'd missed. 

 With a mighty crash, the 48 tonne serpent went into the sand dunes of Armageddon, dead. Its tiny brain pierced by a power sword. From where Sebastian stood, he felt the ground shake violently as the snake went down. He soon joined the soldiers' shouts of victory and congratulation hoots. Charleston landed, a proud, but sweaty look on his face. Sebastian joined him quite quickly. 

 "Charleston, that was either the most stupid or most brave thing you've ever done!" Sebastian said, his voice showing clear traces of the man's excitement. "So, what are you going to do now, eh?" 

 "Bring ropes." Charleston said simply. "I'm taking its head with me." With that, Charleston pulled out the sword from the skull of the snake and aimed at it's neck, raised it, hesitated. Charleston lowered his sword, moved a few metres to the left, raised the sword again and this time completed the swing by cutting off the head of the serpent, below the neck-shield. By now, one of the Chimera transport-tanks had come down to them and eight guardsmen were trying to lift the head onto the tank so they could take it home to Hades. They didn't succeed in lifting it until Charleston helped in. He lifted the many hundreds of kilos of bone and sinew easily and threw it onto the tank. Then the soldiers could secure the trophy onto the tank with the ropes they'd found. With that, the small column left the nest. 

 The Imperials had never seen the Berzerker overlooking the scene. He'd been standing behind a boulder, watching. With interest. Kharn, Lord of Berzerkers, but actually named Kevlinn, smiled behind his facemask. 

 "Too bad the cobra didn't get you, Charleston." the dark lord muttered to himself. "It would make things so much easier." 

 Kharn slowly walked away, towards the waiting Rhino-class transports. They would take him to the surroundings of Acheron Hive. As he approached his bodyguard, Kharn thought: "I hope this war makes the Imperials think I've gone desperate. They might just think I'm a spent force. If so, they're playing right into my century long plans..." 

 Acheron Hive, 24 days later 

 Kharn surveyed the massive force arranged before him. Thousands of green-skinned Orks and hundreds of his own proud Berzerkers. It almost brought tears to Kharn's eyes. He'd waited so long for his revenge. The Imperial fools didn't know that they were wrong. There was no glory for a Space Marine in a galaxy of peace. Kharn wanted to prevent that at all costs. If universal peace were acquired, what would become of the thousands of Space Marines? He'd tried to warn all, but only the most devout ones had joined him. His recent alliance with the Orks was highly temporary. If Armageddon was won, he'd call the rest of his army and vanquish the Orks. Kharn knew he'd promised Ghazghkull part of Armageddon, but why keep such a promise to a savage who didn't know the word for peace in his own language? Kharn doubted there was one such word in the 

Orkish vocabulary. Recently, though, Kharn had gotten Ghazghkull out of his hair by giving the huge Ork Warlord the mission on breaking the defence at Hades. The Berzerker Lord knew full well who'd mobilized the defending force; Commissar Sebastian Yarrick. At first, Kharn had been surprised at hearing the human was still alive. But what had it mattered when the government of Armageddon was corrupt, rotten to the core? 

 "My, my," Kharn muttered to himself as he walked down to meet with the Ork Warboss who commanded this part of the Orkish army. "I will never seize to be amazed at how the Imperium slowly suffocates itself." Kharn smiled at the fact his spy network had done well. The many Khornate cultists in the Underhives and the many Genestealer covens. Magus Grimjaw was an invaluable ally. If Kharn was to order Grimjaw to... No, it would be too easy. Besides, Yarrick was Kharn's personal enemy. Slowly, to himself, Kharn admitted a flaw. He was greedy concerning his personal vendettas and enemies. He wanted them all by himself. He also knew he had to change. It had gone ill because of it in the past. 

 Planetary Governor Herman von Strab looked out the great observation window of the highest point of Acheron Hive: Spire Lv 700. He'd broken contact with Holt a few days ago. The man had gotten what he wanted from the governor. Herman knew he was in deep trouble if the Imperials would arrive now. The Warp-storm had seized a few days ago, and most surely, the Imperium had now found out, no matter if Yarrick was behind it or not. Rubbing his temples to ease the throbbing pain in his head, Herman von Strab decided to give one last speech to the billions of citizens of Acheron Hive. 

 "Citizens of Acheron Hive! You must by now know that 70% of Armageddon's industry is in the hands of the enemy. They have taken every single hive, except Hades, which is under siege, Tartarus and Acheron, your homes. At this very moment, the barbaric horde led by the grim Lord Kharn stand at the edge of Acheron, joined by the Orks. I cannot promise any salvation of any kind. All I can do is hope for a miracle to happen, a sign of the Emperor. But I promise you this: We will fight to the bitter end if necessary, and if we do, we will prevail. Evil such as that of the Fell Gods cannot be tolerated and the Holy Sword of the Emperor shall vanquish them! Herman von Strab, Planetary Overlord of Armageddon, out!" 

 As von Strab ended that speech, a short one, the screaming jets of Thunderhawks pierced the sky. Herman flew out of his chair and looked out. A look of shock and horror was upon his face; he knew what awaited him if they found out what he'd done. He'd end up in Court Martial and... 

 He saw the colours of the Thunderhawks, he knew the Legions: Death Angels, Black Templars and Salamanders. He saw the hundreds and hundreds of ships go down, strafing the horde at the horizon with bolter and battle cannon fire before disgorging their cargo, Space Marine warriors numbering thousands, upon the enemy. He could almost see the green-tide reel backwards. 

 The thump coming from nearby woke Herman from his thoughts. He knew what had landed, a Thunderhawk, and it had landed on the pad on 

Spire Lv 645. Not too far down, but he had to get out of here. He made a quick call on the intern-phone, and then got his overcoat and rushed to the turbo-lift. If he just got away, he'd be safe. 

 Twenty minutes later, three figures clad in power armour step into the room. The fourth is wearing Terminator armour. Two of them are wearing the red armour of the Legio Angelicus Mortes, another is wearing black and white armour with a white robe over and the last one is wearing dragon-green armour. The black armoured one speaks first, his voice having a distinct German accent. "He's gone. We were too slow." 

 "I knew he has been here. I felt him." the taller one of the red armoured said. 

 "I don't like your witchery, Master Lexicanum, but I certainly hope it can be of help." The one with the German accent speaks again. 

 The green armoured man walks forward to the desk and checks the agenda of the planetary governor. He eyes it through, slowly. 

 "Seems von Strab had much planned." he finally says after a moments silence. "Did he actually think he could win this war without help from the Adeptus Astartes?" 

 "He was mad, Chapter Master Tu'shan." Master Lexicanum Edward McKenzie said and looked away from the window he'd been standing by. 

 "I believe we all understood that when you told us about the Titan Legion, Master Lexicanum." Grand Commander Eddie McGranth shot in. "So, what shall we do now?" 

 "Save the planet of Armageddon, of course." McKenzie replied coldly. 

 "I didn't mean like that." McGranth said and walked up to his old friend. "I mean that what are we going to do about the war-criminal von Strab? 

You said he was going to be here...but he ain't!" McGranth did a livid gesture with his arms. "Only thing I'm wondering over is who'll command the forces of Armageddon?" 

 "Can't that Yarrick do it?" the German said again. 

 "I don't think that's an option, High Marshal Helbrecht." McKenzie replied, just as coldly as before. "I heard he was engaged in the defence of Hades 

Hive." 

 "Stop it, both of you." McGranth cut in. "I didn't mean the Guard only, I meant the entire of the forces. Supreme Commander?" 

 Tu'shan seemed ponderous for a while. Then he spoke. "I'd put my vote on you, Grand Commander." 

 After a few minutes of silence, Helbrecht said he'd agreed on that. "You're the one with the most battle-experience of all of us." 

 McGranth was taken aback by this sudden act. Thirty minutes on Armageddon and already Supreme Commander? Couldn't believe it. He had to make all the bigger decisions. He'd acted under other Marine Commanders before, but he'd never been Supreme Commander on a planetary operation like this. McGranth made his first decision four minutes into his new commanding position. 

 "Tu'shan, take your Salamanders and reinforce or at least try to stop the Orks at Hades. I've got a company there, 8th, but I fear there not much left of it." 

 Tu'shan saluted and walked out. Grand Commander McGranth turned to Helbrecht.  

 "You take command of the forces at Acheron together with me. Our mission will be to push the Orks and Berzerkers away from Acheron and push them out of each bloody hive." Helbrecht understood the underlying order and nodded. He then too walked off. 

 McGranth turned to McKenzie. "You don't like Helbrecht, do you?" 

 "Eddie, his Legion has condemned psykers of any kind. There's no love lost between him and me." 

 McGranth simply nodded at the answer and fell silent for a while. He felt a creeping feeling inside him. Could this be? 

 "Is this just another misgiving attack from Kharn, Edward?" he asked at final. 

 "I'm sad to say it might be. If it is, it has cost the Imperium vast military resources and civilian lives by the billions have been wasted. All because of a corrupt command." 

 "Can anything be done about this?" 

 "You can put a new family in reign, Eddie. You've got the authority. But that's not your real concern is it?" 

 McGranth sighed at McKenzie's ability to read him like a book, quite literally. 

 "No, my real concern is Sebastian. Is he still alive?" McGranth asked and looked at McKenzie with weary eyes. 

 "He's alive alright. I'm not sure if he's going to be that for so many more days. When we see him again, I have a feeling he's changed a lot."

Hades Hive, 3 days later 

 "Artis, I tell you to go! Take your family with you and flee!" Sebastian shouted to the Hive Monitor. He didn't want to admit it, but he'd almost choked on the last word. As a commissar, it was against his principles to run away from battle, but Artis needed to get away safely. He was too kind a person to be wasted. 

 "Commissar, why don't you come with us?" Artis said as he stopped in his tracks and turned round at Sebastian. "Why fight for a hopeless cause?" 

 "It's not hopeless!" Sebastian screamed, completely losing it. "The Orks may have breached the outer skirts of Hades, but the main Hive is still in our hands. I'm not leaving." 

 "Then I'll stay with you," Artis said calmly. "It was an unwritten rule in the Navy for the Captain to go down with his ship. I am the Hive Monitor. I'll die with Hades..." 

 "Michael, I'm not telling you any more. I'm ordering you take your family and go!" Sebastian said and looked away from the noble. 

 Artis walked closer to Sebastian. "Seb, you know I won't..." 

 In under a second, Sebastian had pulled out his laspistol and aimed the laser-sight between Artis eyes. There were anger but also sorrow in the old man's eyes, Michael could see. 

 "Hive Monitor Michael Artis, you're being told to leave Hive Hades one final time by a man with a gun. Go!" Sebastian said, his voice shaky from the act he had to perform. If Michael didn't turn round and walk into the Thunderhawk, Sebastian knew he had to pull the trigger. He hoped in his heart that Michael knew that the threat was real. Sebastian almost sighed in relief to see the bulky man turn round and walk into the Thunderhawk transport, reluctantly at first, throwing glances over his shoulder at Sebastian, who stood at the aircraft platforms of the space harbour. Artis shuttle was one of the last to leave. 

 When the last shuttle had disappeared, Sebastian walked back from the docking port. Cerberus followed him in his tracks. His bandage had been removed since long back. Lately, the wolfhound had been at an orphanage to cheer children up. The big, old dog had enjoyed it, though some children had been afraid of him in the beginning. Cerberus was part Chaos hound, a crossbreed, and had clear marks of this. His mane, his very build shouted out that his grandfather had been a Chaos hound. But as the weeks had passed a turned into months, more and more children had arrived at the orphanage. Seb had himself made sure that the children got it as good they could on food rationing. At first, when Artis came with the plan he'd gotten from the noble house council over how rationing should be planned, Sebastian had become raving. He had stridden into the council and demanded an explanation. The one he'd gotten had only made his temper worse. It had ended with that rationing for all was the same and that those children without homes and mother and father would be taken care of in special orphanages. These had been created from unused warehouses and the like, and most orphanages had been placed in the main Hive Spire. When Sebastian thought back on it now, it had been a wise choice to place them there. The further the children were from the Orks, the better. 

 Sebastian walked down the many stairs to Upper Hive Lv 45 and went out to the plaza with the Crystal Oak. He couldn't believe it was so many months ago since he'd first seen it. It was impressive. Down here, on the same level as the Oak, he saw how large it really was. Sebastian whistled lowly to himself. It had to be at least a few hundred metres high, he guessed. As Sebastian stood there daydreaming, he felt something tug in his greatcoat. At first he ignored it, as he thought it was Cerberus wanting his attention. The weak little voice startled him. 

 "Mister, I can't find mom..." a little girl, maybe not more than six years old, said. Sebastian looked down at her. She was black-haired as most people of Armageddon, and it was in a page-haircut. She had bright, blue eyes and was wearing worn and dirty clothing. As the little girl realized she'd been tugging Commissar Yarrick's coat, she shied away a bit from him. But when she saw Cerberus, her tension eased a bit. She'd heard about the big, red wolf that took care of children. Rumours spread quickly in Hives like Hades. 

 Sebastian hunched down to get in eye-level with the little girl. "Don't be shy," Sebastian said softly. "You know I won't harm you." 

 The girl walked slowly closer, afraid that the Imperial Hero would harm her. At least it seemed so in Sebastian's eyes, he couldn't know if the girl had any sins on her mind. At final she got so close that she could hug Cerberus firmly. Sebastian was surprised at this, but masked it. Cerberus just seemed to enjoy it and sat down and let the girl embrace him as long as she wanted. After a few minutes, she let go of the wolfhound and looked at Sebastian. Seb saw the speck of disbelief in the girl's eyes as it came. He knew how to react as well. 

 "I know, I don't look as an Imperial Hero, do I?" 

 "No," the little girl answered, cautiously. "They say yo're two metres tall 'n stuff. 'N that yo've got a metal claw for an arm 'n yo're full o' muscle. 

'N that yo're eye can shoot layser." 

Her Underhive accent was very strong. Sebastian somehow felt misplaced talking flawless Low Gothic, High Gothic and Armageddon Main Tongue. 

 "Did you imagine me as such?" Sebastian asked after a short pause. The girl shook her head. "You see for yourself that it wasn't true, right. But some of it is true." 

 "What?" the girl asked, walking closer to Sebastian. Sebastian sat himself properly on the lip of the fountain surrounding the Oak. The hunched position wasn't good for his old back and legs. The girl sat down beside him. 

 "Well, my bionic eye can in fact shoot laser, and I do have a metal claw." Sebastian said and smiled. He sent his good hand into his pocket and reached for something in it. 

 "Still, yo don' look like ta Saviour o' Hades Hive." the girl said and looked thoughtful. Sebastian looked curiously at the girl. 

 "What did you call me?" he asked. 

 "Ta Saviour o' Hades Hive. People in ta Underhive call yo that since ta thing with that Ork." 

 Sebastian was still surprised, but then he remembered. "Here you go." he said and handed over a piece of his rationing card. "I take it that as your parents are gone, they've joined the Emperor at the Throne." 

 The girl took the little piece of paper that was offered to her. "What do yo do with this?" she asked. 

 Sebastian got up and made a sign to her to also get up. "I'll show you, if you follow me to Upper Hive Lv 45's orphanage." 

 "My parents are dead, right?" the girl said with sorrow in her voice, as she looked up at Sebastian with tearful eyes. Sebastian met them for a few seconds, then broke it. He couldn't stand such eyes. Lately, he'd learned to ignore them, but this girl seemed to become too much. 

 "Yes," Sebastian sighed, sorrow almost breaking through in his voice too as he thought of all the dead. "I believe they are." 

 "I thought so." the little girl said and felled silent tears. 

 Yet another Orkish bombardment shell tore out a hole in the wall of the huge chapel. Sebastian didn't throw a double glance at those who'd been killed by the blast. Anyways, there wasn't much to see. He'd seen the sight countless times before the last days. He hadn't slept properly for a week now, and his weariness was beginning to shine through in his awareness. He'd merely avoided being killed by an Orkish chain-axe a few hours earlier. Sebastian jumped over debris and rubble and bodies. The brave men and women of the company at his command followed him without question. They moved out at the back of the chapel, Sebastian leaving lastly. He gave the toppled over statue of the Emperor a last glance and went out, mumbling a battle-psalm under his breath. Sebastian knew that they were slowly being surrounded by the Orks here in the Underhive. He was happy that Cerberus wasn't here. He'd put the dog on watching over one of the orphanages, he instilled some sort of inspiration amongst the children, the same effect that Sebastian, and hundreds of others of commissars for that matter, had on soldiers. 

 "Sir! Ambush!" a soldier called and Sebastian spun round. He saw how the warning soldier was torn to pieces by a crude Ork sword. The beast chuckled darkly as it approached the old commissar. 'Poor fool,' Sebastian thought. The Ork lunged at Sebastian but didn't complete its leap, at least not in one part. The Ork, known amongst his friends as Gutzog, got the odd feeling that his torso fell on one side of the old human and his legs on the other. In his own crude tongue, Gutzog prayed to Gork and Mork that the Painboyz wouldn't get to him... 

 The sudden Ork attack was the last Sebastian wanted. He watched in horror at the scene before him. Once again he felt the enfeeblement he'd felt that day in the Military Council and the day more than fifty years ago. He felt himself frozen on the spot, unable to do anything, while his company got slaughtered. He saw how Lieutenant Fretner was split in two by an Ork's chain-axe. Sebastian would remember the man's scream of pain till his dying day, every night. Suddenly, something inside of Sebastian stirred. He would never know what it had been, but it had been his family's genes giving him a notice of who he was, and what was expected of him. So did his commissar part; it screamed for him to do something, at least say good-bye! Sebastian pulled himself together and jumped up on the remnants of a statue. 

 "Warriors of Armageddon!" he shouted. "The green tide of Orkdom is upon us and we are alone. There can be no mercy. No surrender. If we survive this day it'll be a miracle!" Sebastian pulped the skull of an attacking Ork easily with his claw. He hated interruptions. "But for the Emperor's sake, we won't go down without a fight. We'll defend our honour and our homes no matter the cost! We'll make the Orkish scum pay for every inch of Hades 

Hive!!" 

 With a loud, raucous roar, three hundred men and women, aged from 18 to nearly 60, jumped on the Orks with renewed vigour. They would give their lives to the Emperor with glee, knowing that Commissar Yarrick would be able to avenge their deaths. They wouldn't know the situation four hours after the last man had fallen of Deadalus Scratch Regiment 4th Company, when Commissar Yarrick was dead on his feet with fatigue and scarred and wounded somewhat terribly. 

 "Come on! I am not afraid!" Sebastian screamed, his strident voice echoing far in the hollows of Hades Underhive. He was standing atop a pile of 

Ork bodies, swinging his big Orkish claw around. He was so tired, his body so wracked with pain that he didn't think he was able to fight one more 

Ork, how easy it even would be. 

 One Ork warrior, brave, or stupid enough, charged at Yarrick. Sebastian heard how his comrades screamed in the Orkish tongue to don't do it. It was the Bale Eye, The 'Oomie wot could kill wiv a glance'. As the Ork came close to him, Yarrick grinned as the Ork foolishly ran his sword right into Seb's claw. Sebastian snipped off the sword and then closed the claw's blades around the Ork's neck. He didn't close them completely, just so that the Ork was held in a choking grip. Bringing the Ork's stinking features close to his own lean, lined face, Sebastian hissed in the tongue of the Orks: 

 "Yoo should 'ave listund ta yer friends. Dey don' call me da Bale Eye fer nofing!" 

 The bionic device that now was Sebastian's left eye blazed with a blinding light. Sebastian let go of the dead Ork's limp body, a smoking hole between its eyes. Smoking was also Sebastian's bionic eye. He saw though the haze of smoke how the other Orks backed off from him. The one he'd shot was apparently some sort of leader. Sebastian noticed something else. In the beginning he heard it more than saw it; the sound of boltgun fire. A few seconds later, he saw the hazy forms of green armoured Space Marines. The Orks below him turned to face the huge super humans and blazed away. Knowing that the Orks didn't care anymore of him, Sebastian passed out from fatigue. 

 Space Marine Trooper Set'ar of the Salamander's 3rd Company made a quick sweep of a blown out chapel with his auspex. The tracking device gave no showings of life readings. No motions, no body heat. It was just as well, he thought grimly to himself. Nothing could have survived in there. 

The entire roof had fallen in. Set'ar didn't want to admit it, but the broken statues of the Emperor and his Saints; Armagon, Icharian, Volrath, Le'man, and Noktorno amongst them, made him feel sick. The big Space Marine walked round the razed chapel. As he did so, he did the sign of the Emperor across his chest plate. Unlike most of his brethren of the Salamanders, Set'ar was more true to the Emperor than the Primarch their legion had come from. But like his brethren, Set'ar was nearly two and a half metres high, very brawny and dark skinned. Their home-planet, Nocturne, had a higher gravity than most inhabited planets in the Imperium, and that was saying something. 

 As Set'ar made it to a clearing, he saw a sight that made him dumbstruck. He'd seen much in his service as Space Marine, but nothing as this. 

Before was a ten metres high pile of Ork bodies. Set'ar realized after a few seconds there were human corpses amongst the Orks. He took up his auspex and made a check of the pile. Someone could be alive. 

 Nothing. No readings at all. Set'ar felt his heart sink. He'd been told from Chapter Master Tu'shan that the Death Angels' had had a company stationed here when the war broke out. The Lieutenant Commander of the company, a Charleston he remembered, had told them the casualties of civilians as well as military. All the commanders present at the meeting had been horrified at the bloodbath. So had Set'ar when he'd been told. Though he didn't understand why Great Tu'shan had accepted Grand Commander McGranth's order that Salamanders were to protect all convoys of refugees and other non-honourable work. Tu'shan had said there was more honour in this than battle, but Set'ar didn't agree. At least they'd gotten this mission to liberate Hades Hive, together with the Black Templars. But when the Templars had done their part, they flew off to another mission, leaving the Salamanders and the Steel Legions to clear Hades of Orks. More haughty Space Marines than the Black Templars, one had to search for, Set'ar thought. 

 The auspex gave to a beep! Set'ar looked down shocked at it. He reached up and took off his helmet. His vision-slits could be screwing up again; they'd done it before. No, the auspex was still beeping, weakly, but there was someone alive in the mound. Or was it atop it? Set'ar put the auspex on the back of his left forearm and pulled out his bolt pistol. It could as well be an Ork who was alive. Nimbly for his size, Set'ar climbed up the mound of bodies. As he climbed he signalled via the vox-link in his ear to Apothecarion Te'thran. 

 "Apothecarion Tethran, this is Marine Set'ar of 4th squad. Could you come to the square of Underhive Lv 23, name c-45/th? I've found a live one." 

 Set'ar's voice was full of a melodious dialect, as was the Apothercarion's as he replied. 

 "Acknowledged, trooper. I'm sending one of my orderlies though, 2nd and 3rd squad have found a pocket of surviving Orks." Te'thran's voice crackled back. 

 "Set'ar out!" Set'ar replied and went over the lip of the hill. As he did so he prepared to meet a half dead Ork, but what he met was nothing of that. 

He stared into Sebastian Yarrick's relaxed, almost dead face. Set'ar noticed that the chest barely moved up and down, meant slow breathing. He also saw the numerous wounds on the old man's body. The commissar was in dire need of medical care. 

 "Set'ar to HQ!" he signalled in his vox-link. "I've found Commissar Yarrick and he's not in good shape. I advise you to respond immediately. HQ? Respond!" 

Imperial HQ; Acheron Hive, 2 months later 

 Sebastian slowly opened his right eye. He quickly regretted the move, as a burning white light stung his eyes. As nothing seemed to happen, he slowly raised his arms and rubbed his temples. It took him a good five minutes to realize that he was rubbing himself with both hands. Sebastian tried to open his eyes again. This time it went well. He was still too dazed to understand where he was, but he did understand that his right arm was in one piece. 

 "Then it was just a dream then..." he mumbled silently to himself. As he said that, his left hand touched something metallic. He let it travel there for a while until he understood it was the plug for the cord to his bionic eye. Several things came into realization now for Seb. Firstly, that he hadn't been dreaming, and for that fact, he nearly sighed in relief. Secondly, he was lying in a hospital bunk. He glanced to his left and saw the thin tubes from the infusion running down and into his arm. He also saw the numerous scars from stitched wounds. Sebastian slowly remembered what had happened before he passed out. And still, his right arm was there. It wasn't off at the elbow... 

 Sebastian dared a look at it. He saw the hand, it looked like his own, and a part of the forearm. But halfway down the forearm, the skin-tissue ended and the metallic skeleton of a bionic implant was revealed. Sebastian also saw the connection joint into his elbow stump, his horrid scarred stump of an arm. 

 He screamed. 

 McKenzie, who'd been snoozing on a chair in a corner, woke with a start. So did Cerberus, who was lying at his feet. The two metres thirty tall Marine got over to Sebastian and tried to calm him down. It wasn't easy. The old man was hyperventilating because of his sudden shock. 

 "Sebastian, calm down," McKenzie urged. "It's over. The nightmare is over... The Orks and Berzerkers are being destroyed as we speak." 

 Sebastian looked at McKenzie with his tired eyes. To see the tall Marine was relieving. McKenzie had a close bond with Sebastian, as he'd had with grandfather. Sebastian felt something big and warm poke him on his left arm. To see Cerberus's wet nose and fuzzy head made Seb feel happier. At least he hadn't lost another one of his friends. As if McKenzie had been reading his thoughts, he said; "I'm sorry about Ishmael." 

 "It wasn't your fault..." Sebastian said. He couldn't believe how feeble and weak his voice sounded. "Besides, he gave his life in the Emperor's duty, as any commissar should..." 

 McKenzie still looked a bit troubled though. Sebastian wasn't sure if it was because of the war or something else. The old man couldn't really remember if he'd ever seen McKenzie this troubled. His eyes was lined, and if McKenzie been an ordinary human, Sebastian could have sworn the big Marine now felt as old as he actually were. Something was troubling him, Sebastian was sure of it now. He'd seen that look once before in his life, and Seb knew exactly what it meant. 

 "McKenzie what is it?" Sebastian said and tried to sit up. The new arm was a bit irritating, as Sebastian had grown used to having none. McKenzie sat down on the hospital bunk and Cerberus jumped up in it as well. The big dog nimbly walked over so that he could lie down on Sebastian, without harming the old man. 

 "I am not really allowed to tell you Sebastian, but the last 300 years are beginning to make sense to me." McKenzie replied in a whispering tone. 

 "What do you mean?" Sebastian asked. Cerberus had put his head so that it rested on Seb's chest. 

 "It's classified Sebastian." McKenzie said with a suddenly stern voice. "Not even the Inquisition should know what I know. Only Ed and Eddie know, and that's because I've known them for over 500 years." The Marine gave Sebastian a hard look. Sebastian understood he should ask any more in this matter, he wouldn't get any responses anyway. Instead, a new question formed in his head. 

 "What is this bionic arm for?" he asked, and McKenzie's ease over this was obvious. 

 "A prototype of a new arm I'm working on. It has everything a natural arm has, including neural cords and skin, though the skin isn't really fully-grown on your implant." 

 "Spare me the technical crap, Edward." Sebastian spat. "I just want to know why, I've already got a new limb-replacement." 

 "You mean the battle-claw? It's on repair, and having a normal hand and arm doesn't hurt." 

 "Maybe not." Sebastian said and absently scratched Cerberus with his new right hand. Cerberus gave him a big wet dogs-kiss as a thank-you. 

 There was a long pause of silence. McKenzie wasn't sure if he was to ask Sebastian the questions he had on his mind. The old commissar seemed so happy of being rejoined with his pet. Sebastian broke the long silence though. 

 "I'm not going to retire, if you think so." Sebastian said and looked on McKenzie with a look full of the iron will of his family. 

 "Strange," McKenzie replied and crossed his arms over his chest. "I heard Ed say you were going to retire before the war." 

 "That was before the war, yes. This is now." 

 "You should at least rest until your wounds have healed properly, before that, I recommend you stay here in Acheron." McKenzie smiled. He seemed much more familiar with out his armour. Sebastian preferred him that way. 

 Something seemed to search it's way to Sebastian from the depth of his memory. Something suppressed by pain, fatigue and unconsciousness. 

 "The Artis family! Are they okay?" Seb asked with a sudden look of fear in his face. 

 "Okay as can be. They had a somewhat bumpy ride, but when they got to Acheron, Lord Artis informed us directly of the situation in Hades." 

 McKenzie was quiet for a minute or two until he talked again. He'd decided something that was obvious. 

 "Sebastian, I want to hear, in detail, why a distress signal wasn't sent out earlier. I received one personally from Astropath Zebulon, but by then Prime had already fallen, right?" 

 Sebastian knew what McKenzie was referring to. Sebastian told him the whole story. 

 "I'll tell you McKenzie, I wasn't informed until Volcanus and Death Mire had fallen. By then it was too late. And von Strab's ignorance and arrogance didn't make it easier." 

 "You mean Herman von Strab, the planetary Overlord? He, to whom your the tactical advisor?" McKenzie said, sounding not too surprised.

 "Was tactical advisor." Sebastian corrected him. "I got 'fired'." 

 "He didn't listen to you, did he?" McKenzie said understandingly. 

 "No, just like his father Luthor ten years ago and my grand-father nearly sixty years ago." Sebastian sighed heavily. 

 "Do you think it would have made any difference if Luthor and Rolf had listened to you, Sebbie?" McKenzie said and tilted his head in a strange way. 

It looked like he was listening to something. 

 "No." Sebastian replied quietly. "Death would have taken them sooner or later anyhow." 

 "Precisely!" McKenzie exclaimed and looked triumphant. "But, von Strab is not dead!" 

 "Frekk it! I had hoped that ass-hole had died!" Sebastian shouted so suddenly Cerberus started and gave away a weak yelp. He wasn't used in seeing his master like this. 

 "He's theoretically dead, Sebbie." McKenzie said, still with a smile on his lips. Upon seeing Sebastian's questioning look, he answered. "He escaped in a Land Speeder, but it was found two days later in the middle of the Equatorial jungle. We're meeting hard resistance from Ork in that sector. Prime is as good as taken back. It's only here on Secondus that the Berzerkers are still at large. We have our suspicions that Kharn is still on this planet, because of the fighting will of the Berzerkers." 

 "But theoretically doesn't exist in my world McKenzie. Either you are dead, or not." Sebastian said and looked sourly on the Marine. Why did he twist words so much? 

 "Sebastian, he wouldn't survive too long out with all the wild animals, and the Orks." McKenzie said and patted Sebastian's shoulder. "Besides, he's an Armageddon Noble. He doesn't know too much about surviving in the wild. Now, if he'd been well trained like a Marine, or a commissar, he'd have a sporting chance." 

 "Speaking of commissars..." Sebastian mumbled. "Who's taking charge of the commissarial duties now? I was most high-ranking commissar here, being one in the Imperium's service, not Armageddon's." 

 "Commissar-general Richter is commanding most things, though Holt from the Armageddon Commissariat has almost got more control over it all." McKenzie said and scratched his chin in thought. "Never seen a man with such a thin face. Could almost think he'd been in a labour camp for years." 

 Sebastian barely took notice of McKenzie's last comment, as his brain was concentrating on putting two and two and three together. Sebastian and Ishmael had always been friends, though Ishmael had been more social. Sebastian had as compensation a gift for detective work, which he was unmatched in. No other commissar could even begin thinking in the way Sebastian usually thought when trying to find a pattern in a chaos of clues and hints. Right now he was putting the finishing touches to a mystery ten years old. McKenzie noticed this. 

 "What is it Seb?" 

 "A lot of things is and isn't..." Sebastian mumbled silently. "When I first met Holt, he was paunchy, a sign of really good living. Every time I've met him these ten years since he became chief commissar of Armageddon, we've eaten dinner together and discussed things. Each and every time he's ordered food that should keep him on his weight. Answer me this McKenzie, why hasn't he grown fat on it? He's a got a still job, and should because of such living, but instead he's grown thinner and thinner." 

 "A curse?" McKenzie suggested. Sebastian gave him a look that said he should stop listening to Charleston's talk of monster movies. 

 "Don't think so. Anyway, ten years ago, I took the mission on solving the mysterious deaths of Luthor von Strab and his sons. It became more and more apparent as research progressed that Herman was behind it, but when I handed it over to Holt, who said it was a matter of the Armageddon Commissariat, he deemed Herman von Strab unguilty and freed the man from any suspicions. Recently, I heard Holt talk about that the matters with Herman's brothers and father wasn't closed. Why pull that up? The case was closed, Holt made sure it was so himself. And why has von Strab begun listening so much to Holt's advise lately?" 

 "I'm not the one to judge it Seb, but Holt could be bribed. He's no more than human." McKenzie said and got up. He straightened his shirt a bit. 

 "Weird, Artis said the same when I discussed it with him. But a commissar shouldn't take bribes; it is against all his ideals to accept money from someone else!" 

 "Sebastian, not all people are as honest and fair as you are. You'll have to learn that some day." McKenzie said and looked at Sebastian with a tired look. 

 "But he's a commissar!" Sebastian protested. 

 "But he's not more than human, Sebastian. You can't ask of perfection from him." McKenzie sighed. Rolf had been easier to convince, that was sure. 

 "I think I'll pay Holt a visit when I'm ready to go outside the hospital." Sebastian mumbled sourly to himself. 

 "Do so." McKenzie said and gave Sebastian a data-slate. "In the meantime, write down a report on what happened in Hades. That's routine for all refugees from that Hive. And get some rest." 

 "Yes, mom." Sebastian mumbled absently as McKenzie left. As soon as McKenzie had left though, Seb slid out of his bunk and got dressed. Cerberus seemed to understand what was happening. He pulled away one of Sebastian's jackboots and the old man reached for it. Sebastian sighed. 

 "Cerberus, hand it over! I don't have time for these games." 

 Cerberus didn't obey. As much as the dog hated it, he couldn't make his master break orders that were for his own good. He watched in silence as his master put on his tunic and removed the bionic arm. His master didn't like it, it seemed. After a bit of trouble with the loose arm and his coat, 

Sebastian bowed down to take the boot from Cerberus. This time, however, Cerberus let him have it. Maybe it was better for his master to do whatever he was going to break orders for. Last time it had been visiting a powerful psyker and helping people. 

 "That's a good boy!" Sebastian said and patted Cerberus in the side as he got his boot back. Seb put it on and looked at Cerberus's hopeful eyes. 

 "I'm sorry old boy, but I'll have to do this alone." Sebastian said and got up. He took something from the table by the bunk and pressed it into his bionic eye's socket. It was a tiny battery that supplied the eye with enough power to see, but it couldn't fire the laser beams. There wasn't enough power in it for that. 

 "Stay here Cerberus." Sebastian said and sneaked out, intent on finding Holt and getting an explanation to it all. 

 Slowly, very slowly, as if to slow down the pain with the movement, James Holt pulled the syringe out of his left underarm. It didn't matter if he'd pulled it out with a jerk, it still hurt somewhat and he winced at the pain. The only thing that the slow movement had helped was that the flow of blood wasn't so great. He'd learned that quickly, Holt was no fool. He put the empty syringe with the bloody cannula on his desk and picked up a plaster and put over the tiny pinch wound in his arm and pulled down the sleeve of his uniform jacket. Holt picked up the syringe again and played a bit with it as he looked around in his office. It was not really big, but not small either. Somewhere in between. His desk stood before a big view port, which overlooked the inner parts of Acheron Hive. At the moment it was full of communiqués from different regimental commissars in the PDF and the 

Steel Legions, but a few books where also laid on it. Amongst them were two worth notice: a fiction novel titled The Great Betrayer, halfly finished, and a huge tome, leather-bound and ancient looking, with it's title written in 24 carat gold-paint: Codex: Terra. Under it was another book, not as big, but just as ancient looking and it also with it's title written in gold: Committerea Imperius. 

 Holt let his eyes travel from his desk to the other parts of the room. On the walls to his left and right, bookshelf upon bookshelf was lined, only breaking for a portrait or a bust of a famous man or woman in the service of the Imperial Commissariat. There were obvious breaks in the lines of books in the shelves, holes where books should be. Most of them maybe borrowed by a comrade-in-arms. Others by some other institute. Holt studied the portraits for a while. On his right from where he was sitting, he knew he had Commissar-general Chomaki, Commissaress Hawkins (a beautiful woman, Holt thought), Commissar Timosjenko and Commissar Mischkjin, founder of the entire commissar rank. On his left Holt knew these by heart: Commissar-general Reichard, Commissar Wiedelmann and one more, one that made Holt feel a bit insecure, Commissar-general Yarrick. The last one had liberated Armageddon, but his grandson was now a big problem for Holt. As Holt swung around in his office-chair to look out the great window, he heard the automatic doors open and close with a hiss behind him. 

 "Speaking of the devil," Holt said halfly to himself, halfly to Sebastian who'd just entered. He didn't care that he was still toying with the syringe, 

Yarrick had found out, otherwise he wouldn't be here. Holt was, as said, no fool. 

 "So, what brings the Saviour of Hades Hive here?" Holt said and swung round to face Sebastian. Now Sebastian finally saw what Ishmael had meant with that Holt had gone gaunt-faced. Holt had indeed lost weight, he looked hollow-eyed and hollow-cheeked. Thin, thinner than the Lord Astropath 

Yarrick had met in Infernus. 

 "You," was Sebastian's curt but true answer. "James, may I ask for an explanation to all this?" Sebastian said with a gesture. Holt knew he meant the reason to the syringe, the von Strab murders and all the rest. 

 "Why, most certainly I'll give it to you Sebastian!" Holt said and smiled viciously. The smile didn't reach the weary, bloodshot eyes. "I'll begin with the reason for this!" Holt held up the syringe with the blood-dripping cannula so Sebastian could see and then threw it into his wastebasket. 

 "I'm a morphine addict," Holt said and settled back in his chair. "I've been so for nearly ten years, with steadily increasing dosages. The reason is that this is a stressy job, and I needed something to clam my nerves with. In the beginning the dosages were so small, that it didn't tear too much on my credit account. But as the dosages increased, so did the prize and I began running out of money for it. As you knew me way back then Sebastian, you know I was overweight. Nearly one hundred and fifty kilos was my top notation. Now, morphine has that bi-effect that you lose weight from it. A good thing, I thought back then. Now, it's barely as good. Can you guess what I weigh today, Yarrick, can you?" 

 Holt arose from the chair, and now Sebastian saw how thin he was. He was barely skin and bone. No wonder he looked gaunt. 

 "I...I...don't know James." Sebastian stammered forth. He was so shocked over how thin the man was. And still standing two meters tall. 

 "I weigh just as much as you do, or did back then; 65 kilos. The morphine bi-effect became a curse. Hell, I can't even have women!" 

 Holt breathed in and out heavily a few times and then sat down in his chair again, resting his head in his palms. He began talking again. 

 "You see Sebastian, at that time, something wonderful happened. Wonderful in a macabre way. The von Strab family was picked off, one by one. Anton was killed by a bomb, Otto by a hit-and-run driver and Villhelm was shot. You were put on the case as it concerned the family of an Imperial Planetary Commander. You were also a good friend of Luthor von Strab, you'd known the man a long time." 

 "I'd known him since I came to Armageddon as a young man, James." Sebastian interrupted. 

 "Right," Holt said and picked up the thread again. "You were on the case as a hungry wolf on a deer's tracks, excuse the relation there, but the Adeptus Arbites were nagging you right? They said the case was a matter of their office, but you wouldn't listen. So wouldn't Luthor I believe, when he ate that fugu-fish. That poisonous fish. The obituary said it had been fugu-poison, but we both knew it wasn't. It had been cyanide, enough to wipe out a regiment. That left Herman as lone member of the von Strab family. It also gave you six months to nail the murderer, cause we both knew it was Herman. Everything pointed towards him, right? After the six moths had passed, he'd be Armageddon's new Overlord. It was now I started to play sneaky on you, Sebastian. 

 "I made a deal with you that you could leave it to me, and you could take some well-earned holidays on some garden-world. We both trusted each other. Boy, that was your first mistake my friend. I might have been fat, but I wasn't stupid. I knew exactly what to do when you were gone. I made another deal, with Herman this time. I showed him our evidence, and said it would all come to daylight, if he didn't put one million credits a month on my cred-account. He had to agree. And since then I've used those evidence as a sort of blackmail, whenever von Strab has displeased me in some way. It has worked fine. Till now. von Strab is gone. So is my monthly income of money. That syringe had contained the last morphine shot ever for me." With a sigh, Holt let his head rest on the Codex: Terra. "I was a fool, and it was all because of this position I have. I was thirty-three years old, already as decorated as a veteran Guard colonel. The Imperial Commissariat made the big mistake of choosing me to command Armageddon's Commissariat. First thing I did was put on weight..." Another sigh. 

 There was a long, horrible silence after Holt finished his confession. Sebastian slowly melted what he'd just heard. It was now obvious. The thing he'd heard at the golf course hadn't just been imagination then. 'Milord Governor, should I remind you that the cases on the murders of your father and brothers still aren't closed?' Sebastian remembered Holt's words clearly from that day. Now they had a meaning. So did the entire story, to Seb. That's why Holt wanted Charleston out of his hair as well. The big klutz of a Marine had the habit of finding out things he shouldn't know about, a habit, which wasn't intended at all. Sebastian chose every word carefully as he took to words. 

 "James, I won't punish you for this," he began. This made Holt look up on him. It was not so clear, but it seemed tears of shame had began rolling down the thin man's face. "I see you're startled to hear that, Jim, but why should I? You're not more than human, are you not?" Holt nodded slowly, not knowing if this was a trick or not. 

 "I see you've been reading the Codex: Terra. Interesting book, isn't it?" Sebastian asked with a friendly voice. 

 "Yes, it is," Holt answered, struggling to avoid his voice from breaking. "Sadly though, it ends at 1265 AD, according to their time system." 

 "I know," Sebastian replied. "Codex: Terra, the compilation book over Project: Terra, a project in which they tried to see how humans adapted to their surroundings without the Emperor to guide them. They did quite well. Around 7000 B.C as they call it in the book, some technology was given to a certain people on Terra. I don't know why, but they gave the Imperial visitors names like Ra, Osiris, Anubis etcetera. They thought they were gods. But that civilisation died out, because of what, no one knows. But the Imperial records in the Codex say that the...Egyptians I think they were called, had slaves of a people called the Hebrews. The Hebrew were later freed and wandered north. They settled down in what the Codex calls the Holy Land. Such blasphemy, Holt, we both know what the real Holy Land is, right?" 

 "The land of the Emperor, the Imperial Palace." Holt said monotone. 

 "Good. Now, the Egyptians slowly declined in power, and were exchanged for a people called Romans. They called their leaders for Emperors, so the Imperial monitors decided to teach them the secrets of High Gothic. The called it Latin though. Odd name for High Gothic, and I've heard a few. Now, the Hebrew were once again chased after. Their religion, the Judaism, wasn't popular to the Romans, who had gods with names like Jupiter, Mars, Volcanus...now there's a funny thing." Sebastian fell silent. "The Romans, and the Greeks, had gods and places named like Hives on Armageddon. Heh." 

 Sebastian carried on his litany. "I mean, Hades, Tartarus, Acheron, Styx, Minos, Morpheus, Euminides, Phlegeton, Chaeron..." Another pause. "Just so odd. Anyway, the Jews believed in that a saviour would come to help them. He came, in a man named Jesus Christ. The Imperial visitors speculated in that he could have been a Paladin, like the Emperor. A future leader for mankind on Terra. But no, the Romans caught him and crucified him." 

 "I know that," Holt finally said after being silent a long time. "I find that certain part very sad." 

 "Indeed, " Sebastian agreed. "Actually, the Romans weren't the reason to that Jesus got crucified. Nope, the Jews were, cause they condemned him to his death sentence. And since then Jews have been chased and killed for that they killed the Saviour of Mankind. Many people, including the Romans ironically, created a new religion, based on the Jewish but with Jesus Christ as the Saviour who died for them, or something like that. They call it Christianity, I believe. But the Jews weren't only the ones who gave Jesus his sentence..." Sebastian moved away from Holt now and picked up a little purse of leather from a pocket. By the chime of it, Holt could tell there were coins in it. 

 "A man named Judas Iscariot, one of Jesus closest friends, betrayed him for thirty silver sickles. That shows how cheap he was..." Sebastian said dryly. The last sentence wasn't meant as a joke. "Judas gave away Jesus' identity with a kiss. The Romans arrested him, and you know the rest."  Sebastian opened the leather purse and poured outs its innings on Holt's desk. A bunch of silver coins chimed and clinked as they fell down on the desk. Holt stared at them. Yarrick was playing him a trick. He had to be. This wasn't true. He knew he'd be punished, but not like that! 

 "Here, I leave you now with your own conscience, comrade. Congratulate yourself; you almost managed to kill the Saviour of Hades Hive! Thirty Imperial Credits in one-credit silver-coins. History only repeats itself, Commissar James Judas Holt!" In Sebastian's voice, nothing was left but spite and anger, not a trace of the kind tone he'd had a few minutes ago. With that, Yarrick made all about face and marched out of the room. Holt was still sitting staring at the coins when two hours had passed since Sebastian had left. He would be sitting for another two at least. Then he stood up, gathered the coins back into their purse and put on his cap and greatcoat. After that he walked out, to buy himself a rope. 

 Historical note: The body of James Judas Holt was found on his office one day after that Commissar Yarrick had visited him. On a data-slate, the well-known and loved commissar confessed several sins and crimes, amongst them accepting bribes. Commissar Holt had obviously hung himself with a powerful rope, well tied to break his neck and not to strangle him. In the message he left behind him, he also left the completed report on the von Strab-family murders conducted ten years earlier. As by common belief, Herman von Strab, former planetary governor of Armageddon, was behind them all. Holt also credited Commissar Sebastian Yarrick for most of the work. There was one last reference in the message to the Codex: Terra and a short quote: "History only repeats itself, but I won't." There were also references to a book known as the Book of Revelations, a book highly connected with the reference in Codex: Terra. Amongst the verses were verse 18 chapter 13 and verse 16 chapter 16. 

Infernus Hive, Spire, Berzerkers cornered as well as orks, 1 week later 

 "Ed, didn't I tell you to cover the west wings of the factory?" Sebastian asked the big Marine as he came diving down beside him with a thump. Charleston looked up with a confused look on his face. He was still wearing the darned warboss's helmet from Tempestora. "What west wing?" he asked after clearing away most of the dirt from his face. Sebastian sighed. This had seemed as such a good idea. Orks as well as Berzerkers in the same Hive, their leaders' HQ, cornering them, taking them out in one swift assault. Easy, in theory. Damned hard in reality. Sebastian cursed silently. 

 He'd brought with him a full company of Steel Legion, leaving their Chimera transports behind cause they weren't needed in the Hive. Steel Legion, Armageddon's finest. Of that company of 400 men, maybe 200 were left. The Orks were taking a heavy toll on them. So was the Berzerkers with their terror attacks, a strategy not entirely their own, Sebastian could understand, but the twisted armour of the Raptor's gave away a horrible, spine-chilling banshee-howl when they dived, so they were quite suited for this sort of attacks. Luckily for Sebastian, Charleston had gotten with him 15 jump-pack equipped Honour Guard. Two were dead. They were 13 now. 

 "12," Sebastian corrected himself as a lucky shot from an Ork shoota took an Honour Guard in the eye.

"What are those?" Charleston said and pointed towards the Orks in the other end of the factory. It was incredible, but there was a factory complex this high into the spire. Sebastian couldn't believe when he first heard it from his scouts. He looked at what Ed had meant. The Orks, dressed up in chunky mega-armour, laughed raucously as the las-shots and bolter shots bounced off their armour. They weren't getting anywhere like this. Seb pulled back his head quickly and checked his storm bolter. There were five shots left in the clip. He looked at Ed again. 

 "Seven to the right, four to the left." Seb said simply, leaned over the edge of the wall were he was crouching. There wasn't much left of it after the Orks had fired their guns. He fired of a burst into the Orks, the armour-piercing Kraken rounds going through the armour of the beasts with ease. Seb's aim was perfect, the explosive shots bursting the skulls of the Orks like overripe fruit. He heard the scream or attempted such as the 

Orks fell to the ground. Seb threw a new glance around the edge, making a fast count. 

 "Four to the right, one to the left and they're gathering in the middle." Seb said as he took his head back and reloaded his storm bolter. 

 "I'm gonna ask again Seb, what are those?" Charleston said. He aimed his plasma pistol very carefully and blew of a shot against the lone Ork to the left. It missed the beast with a few decimetres. Charleston cursed. 

 "Ork nobles, no doubt about it." Seb said as he slammed home the clip and clicked two rounds into place with a thumbing. 

 "Nobles?" Charleston asked confused. "They've got nobles?" 

 "Ork society isn't without honour, Ed. They may be animals in your eyes, but they have a Codex of Honour, just as you do." 

 "What are we going to do then? We're pinned here. Berzerker Raptors behind us and Ork...Nobs before us." 

 "And the Orks are forming an attack." Seb added. "Ed, I want you and your soldiers to lay down a curtain of fire, cause I've got one wacky idea." 

 "Huh?" Charleston saw that Sebastian was looking at something up in the gloom. Only the old man's bionic eye could see it, apparently. Ed decided not to disagree and ordered the Marines and Guardsmen to pin the Orks down with fire on his mark. There were a few seconds of uneasy silence before Charleston gave the order as he saw that Seb was powering up his Bale Eye. The rattle of gunfire filled the blown-out factory and Ed barely recognised the distinctive crack from Seb's laser-shooting eye. He did, however see the fifty tonnes heavy Leman Russ battle tank fall down from the roof and squash the Orks beneath it heavy weight. There was a shocked silence the following moments. 

 "Move on." Sebastian ordered from Charleston's side. The Bale Eye left a tiny, smoking trail as the old man moved. 

 "Nice trick, but a bit messy." Charleston commented as he moved up beside the commissar. 

 "I saw it hanging up in the roof, couldn't resist the temptation." Sebastian said flatly. The small force passed the corpses of Orks, the men of the 

Steel Legion looking away from the mess. Sebastian didn't. One of the green skinned soldiers moved slightly and the old man put a bolt round its head. "They may be our enemies, but they do know what pain is, Ed." Sebastian answered to Charleston's shocked expression. "The best we can do is spare them of it." 

 "Oh, a well rehearsed lie, commissar." Charleston said caustically as they moved on. 

 "Watch your tongue, lieutenant commander..." Sebastian said silently. 

Infernus' Opera house, how many months was it since he'd lastly been here? Sebastian didn't aim the thought to much contemplation. He was in the middle of a firefight with Berzerkers. Berzerkers and Orks, he corrected himself. Seb knew his grandfather's murderer and archenemy was close, he felt it in his blood and soul. His heart was beating fast with anticipation for the coming confrontation with the Dark Lord. 

 "Is it only me, or are the Orks getting bigger?" Charleston shouted over the roar of gunfire. Charleston put a stab of plasma-light into the chest of a charging Berzerker, exploding the renegade's torso. Another Berzerker, standing to Charleston's shoulders, got close with the huge man. Charleston avoided the Berzerker's chain-sword swings and cut the warrior's head of with a deft swipe of his ancient power-blade. He didn't see the Berzerker attacking from behind... Sebastian didn't even shout a warning, he just aimed his bionic eye towards the Berzerker warrior's head and shot. 

Charleston, too engage in combat, didn't notice when the blood-red warrior's head exploded behind him. Sebastian allowed himself a smile at Ed's complete concentration, a concentration that nearly had killed him. 

 Something snorted behind Sebastian's back, and he turned and looked up into the face of a 3 metres tall Ork. Charleston was right; the Orks were getting bigger. These weren't ordinary Boyz, Ork warriors. No these were the absolute elite of Ghazghkull's bodyguard. It took Sebastian half a second to raise his battle-claw and cut the head of the Ork. It was the easiest way to stop them from fighting, Sebastian knew. To cut an Ork's arm or leg off didn't stop them. Jumping over some debris and taking cover behind a largely intact pillar, Sebastian checked himself. They were getting close now. Really close. The Space Marine Honour Guard was all but down to naught; it was Charleston, Captain Mikos Sergeant Teller and two brother-warriors, left. Not much. Seb's Steel Legionnaires had fared not so well they either. Only thirty or so were left, and they were dropping fast now, their lasguns unable to penetrate the Orks' and Berzerkers' thick armour. Sebastian cursed silently. He couldn't, wouldn't fail now, he was so close! He raised his storm bolter and blew the living daylights out of an Ork, which was trying to attack some Guardsmen. As the creature fell to the ground, the soldiers began beating on it with their bayonets. The sergeant saluted Sebastian as thanks. 

 All of a sudden, the room went silent. There were no Orks or Berzerkers left. Charleston came up to Sebastian. He hadn't lost the stupid helmet yet, 

Sebastian noticed. The big marine also seemed tired. Seb guessed it was because of the losses. 

 "We're clear, but Eddie's gonna kill me! Eleven Honour Guard dead! Have you got any idea what he'll do with me?" Charleston complained. 

 "It's not my fault Ed," Sebastian replied simply. "Kharn and Ghazghkull aren't stupid. They haven't become leaders for two of the most violent 'races' known by being stupid." 

 "Could guess so..." Charleston's voice trailed off. "It's quiet, too darned quiet!" 

 "I know," Sebastian said and looked around. "It smells trap long way..." 

 The small force moved on. As they got into the main concert hall of the opera house, Sebastian gasped slightly at what he saw. Desecration, in its worst sense, was what he saw. The huge Eagle chandelier had been torn down. Instead, the light was coming from what looked like a chandelier, but modelled after something heretical or alien, Seb was sure. 

 "Chaos rune," Captain Mikos said flatly. "I've seen it everywhere. What does it mean?" 

 "I don't know," Charleston said and recalibrated his auspex a bit. "But I know one who can answer..." 

 "Battle-brother McKenzie?" Mikos asked, as if already knowing the answer. 

 "Bingo..." Charleston said and took a picture of the chandelier. He frowned a bit, touched the zoom-runes of his photo-auspex and got a look of disgust on his face. "That frekking thing is made of human bones... And pieces of Space Marine armour..." 

 "Desecration..." Sergeant Teller sighed and walked off. "These renegades holds nothing in honour, do they?" 

 Sebastian was about to warn Teller about going away from the crowd. He'd left his soldiers outside, to guard. Instead it had been to avoid them from seeing Chaos-madness, like this. Sebastian's warning never left his lips. He, as the other two, just stared at how Sergeant Teller suddenly jerked, as if having a spasm of some kind. Charleston was the only one to see how the man's eyes went dead. Kharn walked out of the shadows, still holding Teller's body at the end of his battle-axe. The big, gore-coloured warrior walked calmly out to meet the others. He shook Teller's body off his axe and looked the others over. "We do hold things in honour, my friends. Martial prowess. Gach'tla!" 

 Seb knew those words. It was orkish and it meant roughly; "do it!" There was a bang behind them, as the huge entry door to the opera house was slammed shut. The Steel Legionnaires were trapped on the wrong side, all due to Sebastian's orders. Seb cursed, Kharn had known his protocols. Seb had, as he thought of his stupidity, seen the two other Marines of the Honour Guard. They were both ripped asunder by one mighty power-claw. 

 "Ghazghkull Thraka!" was Sebastian Yarrick's first thought. The second one was:"I knew this was a trap! I knew it!". 

 "Now, it's only us..." Kharn began but suddenly stopped. "Brother Mikos, you've done good." Kharn turned to the young Marine. "I knew I could trust you and that you'd succeed." 

 "It was in the Lord's will, master Kharn." Mikos replied softly. "You wanted the Imperial lackeys, I could give them to you." 

 Charleston was shocked. Mikos, a renegade? He didn't want to believe it was true. His ears were broken! That he had trusted the man so, made him his personal adjutant and all. And the little brat turns renegade! 

 "You treasonous dog!" Charleston shouted. Kharn, Ghazghkull and Mikos looked at him. "I taught you everything I knew, and this is my reward?" 

 "Charleston, don't be upset now, I've been doing this for many years now." Kharn said softly. 

 "Shut the frekk up, renegade!!" Charleston said and drew his power sword. "Prepare to be redeemed, as they say in the Inquisition!" 

 "I'll take him master!" Mikos said, pulling out his own power sword. Kharn sighed. It was always the same story. Youngbloods always wanting to show off before him. It cost them their lives more often than not. So was the case of Mikos. The young Marine couldn't possibly match Charleston's skill and strength. Charleston had fought for nearly half a millennia and learned a lot in those years. He was also the strongest Marine every to have lived. Mikos tried to outwit Charleston with nifty and nimble manoeuvres and sword-tricks. Charleston parried them all. After a minute, the commander got tired of the fight and cut Mikos head off in a deft sweep. The beheaded corpse fell to the ground with a thud. 

 "Idiot..." Charleston breathed. "May your soul rot for all eternity." Then he spat at the fallen warrior. "Your turn Kharn!" 

 "Don't think so," Kharn said as a smile crossed his lips. "Ghazghkull, take him out, I'll take the Yarrick!" 

 Seb saw how the huge Ork loomed over Charleston. More he didn't get to see, because Kharn grabbed him by his good arm and pulled him with him... up, towards the ceiling. The Dark Lord wore a jump-pack! Sebastian felt his heart race; he had no chance in bringing a so agile opponent down! 

 "Don't be frightened Yarrick," Kharn said softly, almost tenderly. "I'm just taking us away from the battle below, and any chance of you being saved. 

I want to settle this matter with you, one-on-one, man-to-man, and uninterrupted. Besides, to have you running up the stairs, that wouldn't be good for your health, would it? You're an old man after all." Kharn chuckled darkly to himself. Half a minute later, Kharn dropped Sebastian down on the roof of the opera house. The Berzerker Lord then landed himself, not far from Yarrick. 

 "Sebastian, I wanted to say one thing. I'm not here to kill you. My hatred towards you is abysmal indeed, but to kill you, I won't." 

 "Why?" Sebastian said through clenched teeth. The battle-claw that was his lower right arm was opening itself and closing itself with clicks. Sebastian was full of adrenaline and he wanted to use it. 

 "You might think of me as a beast, a murderer, but I'm much more than that. I want to tell you why I do this, why I'm a Berzerker. The reason? I know you'll listen." 

 "Never in my life!" Sebastian shouted and attacked Kharn with sheer fury and anger. Sebastian no longer fought with his honour and skill; he fought with pure hatred. Hatred and hatred alone was fuelling the Imperial Commissar...

Charleston dodged Ghazghkull's mighty power claw and the huge limb-weapon smashed into a marble pillar. In less than a second, Ghazghkull was free again, to strike at the Marine with renewed anger. Charleston knew what he had to do, facing a monster such as Ghazghkull. His estimations were that Ghazghkull had to weigh at least a tonne with that armour, and that he couldn't possibly outmatch the Ork in close combat. Instead, Ed had to use his intelligence to outwit the Ork. He knew this very well, and wasn't happy for it. Orks lived for war, that Charleston had learned from Yarrick, so Ghazghkull had to be skilled, or was he...? 

 Using his jump-pack to outmanoeuvre and outflank the humongous Ork, Charleston got close enough to take a stab at Ghazghkull with his power sword. A split second before Charleston hit the Ork, Ghazghkull's gun-arm was there and gave Charleston a whack at the head. Charleston dropped to the ground, stunned. He regained his senses just in time to see Ghazghkull raise his power claw to smash the head of the Marine like an overripe fruit. Charleston rolled out of the way, and the claw just took a chink out of his jump-pack armour. Getting to his feet, Charleston swung his power sword in an arc at Ghazghkull's back. The blade bit into the armour of the beast, but failed to do any damage. Ed didn't even mind to curse at this as he pulled the sword free and jumped backwards in a jump-pack powered somersault to avoid being smashed against the wall by the gun-arm. 

 The Ork glared at him, anger in its inhuman eyes. Charleston now saw the half-metal skull of the creature. Adamantium, he guessed. Same material used to create the Terminator suits. Virtually impossible to destroy. 

 "You really choose the wrong planet to frekk with, alien scum!" Charleston hissed. He felt something odd inside of him, a craving for blood to be spilt, Ghazghkull's blood, right here, right now. Charleston hadn't felt this before. He'd heard of the gene-flaw, but never thought it would affect him like it affected Poole and the others of the Assault Company. Now he knew he wasn't immune to the blood curse. 

 "Yooze da wun 'ose wrong, 'Umie!" Ghazghkull growled. "Dis da end uv da wurld fer 'Umies. All 'Umies die, it'z a WAAAGH!" 

 Charleston barely saw the dim, blue light that formed around Ghazghkull's body, but it didn't matter. This alien was as good as dead. Charleston was a Space Marine of the Death Angels Legion, the Emperor's finest and would not die at the hands of a green beast like Ghazghkull. 

 "WAAAGH! on yourself!" Charleston roared back at Ghazghkull. In a flash, Charleston had pulled out his plasma pistol. Firing in blind rage as he was, the shots weren't the usual sloppy ones that Charleston usually fired. The first shot melted the barrel of Ghazghkull's huge, Orky gun, the second blasted apart the power claw and the third blew away the big, metal "jaw" that served as protection for Ghazghkull's lower face-half. Making a diving charge at the beast, jump-pack blazing and power sword alight, Charleston slammed into the huge Ork with a force that should've knocked a Leman Russ battle tank of it's tracks. Ghazghkull didn't even move an inch at the blow. Jumping backwards to avoid Ghazghkull's swinging stump, Charleston took a stab at the Ork's flank as it revealed itself. Later, Charleston could've sworn on that the sword bit through the armour, but it glanced off the skin of Ghazghkull. Before Charleston could figure out why, Ghazghkull had made his choice and Ed had to jump out of the way. The upper part of the power claw was still intact, and the two claw-blades still powered by the reactor at Ghazghkull's back. This gave Charleston an idea. Before he barely had landed, Charleston was up in the air again and was flying towards the power cable that connected the power claw with the reactor. His sword easily cut off the cable and Ed took some delight in hearing the frazzling sound from the claw when it went dead. Ghazghkull's left arm was now useless. Charleston sent his prayer to the Emperor that the Ork wasn't strong enough to lift the claw without the aid of servos. 

 Charleston was now at the front of the Orkoid Warlord again. The Ork glared at him. It growled something unintelligible, alien gibberish it seemed to Charleston. Charleston didn't respond. Not with words. Instead, charging the huge beast head first, Charleston had a blood-curdling roar on his lips. If he had looked up, he would have seen what would have been fear in Ghazghkull's eyes, but Orks aren't human, thus they can't have human feelings. 

 As Charleston reached the beast, he flung his head up to meet with the Ork's massive jaw. Ceramite steel met tough bone and a sickening crack was heard as Ghazghkull's neck snapped and gave away. His jaw had held, but the neck supporting it, hadn't. The also was a more fabricated crack, from when Charleston's looted helmet burst open in the scalp section, but it was almost lost to the loud crack from Ghazghkull's neck. Charleston jumped nimbly out of the way as the one and a half tonne heavy Ork fell to the ground with a resounding thud. Charleston stood panting a long while to regain his breath. He didn't want to admit it, but two times, the Ork had been close to smashing his head to pulp. Almost too close in his taste. 

He dared throw a glance at the fallen greenskin. That had been the Ork that Ishmael had talked about: the Dreadnought sized one. The Beast of the Gideon system. 

 "I'd rather wanna call him the Beast of Armageddon..." Charleston thought to himself. He threw a look at the entry doors. Behind them, the Steel Legionnaires were caught. Ed raised his plasma pistol and pulled the trigger. His shot blew a big hole in the door, big enough for a man to poke his head through it. He then looked up. How was Seb doing? Charleston decided for a horrible answer and flew upwards, despite his fatigue; prepared to send Kharn to the fallen god he worshipped... 

 While Charleston had battled Ghazghkull, Seb had tried to decapitate Kharn at least ten times with his claw, all tries result less. Seb fought with pure hatred, forgetting all he'd learned about honour and righteousness. In a way, he was fighting more evilly than the Dark Lord before him. He wanted revenge, he wanted blood, and he wanted Kharn's neck between his claw-blades. Kharn knew all this very well, and Sebastian was playing him straight into his hands. 

 "I'm telling you once again, Yarrick, I won't fight you." Kharn said as he ducked away from the claw again. Sebastian's reply was a snarl. He'd lost his cap fifteen minutes ago, and his senses twenty minutes ago. He wanted to have his revenge; to repay the blood of his family spilt more than half a century before. Kharn had killed an Imperial Hero; the punishment of such was death. These were thoughts that appeared in Sebastian's raging mind as he fought. They weren't his thoughts; he didn't know were they'd come from, but he welcomed them, embraced them. The fuelled his old body with even more adrenaline. He would have Kharn's head. He knew he would. He jumped at the red-armoured Marine, but Kharn dodged the clumsy attack. But what Kharn hadn't counted on was the bionic eye. All of a sudden, the metallic sense flashed, and Kharn was saved from a killing shot by his Marine reflexes. But the laser beam hit something else; the lock that held Kharn's horned helmet in place. The lock was burned away, but Kharn did not notice this. Instead, he turned to face Yarrick once again. 

 "What I've told you is true. I didn't become a Berzerker because I'm 'evil', such a horrible word. I did it cause I've seen what will happen with the Marines when the Imperium acquires universal peace. We'll be disbanded, forever! I do this to maintain my own race, understand me? Wouldn't you do the same in my boots?" 

 "You're a traitor and a renegade, Kharn!" Sebastian snarled back. "In the Imperium, we have no room for the ones like you! You are trying to brainwash me, to believe in your insane ramblings! I will never give up my belief in the Emperor! Hear me? Never!" 

 "So be it... But you are already giving over to Chaos! Your grandfather would never have fought with hatred, like you! No! He fought with honour, just like I do! But you, Sebastian Yarrick, you are weak, cause you let your feelings guide you! All the time! Don't you think I've watched your progress? Don't you think I knew how you would act? And that Herman von Strab was the Imperial Commander of this site, made it so much easier to make you flaws visible! You grandfather, may he rest long, never showed his flaws as openly as you! He was a much more complicated opponent, as he never let his feelings guide his actions! But you and that big oaf Charleston, you've played me into my hands all along!" 

 "You are losing, Armageddon for you is a lost cause Kharn." Sebastian panted forth. In his mind, the voice was playing once again with his feelings. What was happening with him? 

 "Am I?" Kharn said, a slight tone of amusement in his voice. "This might not be the One, y'know!" 

 Sebastian launched himself at Kharn again, the voice in his mind edging him forward, to engage, to destroy, to spill blood. 

 Yarrick's battle claw got grip around one of Kharn's decorative hair-plumes, and the helmet came off and fell to the ground with a clatter. Kharn stared at Yarrick, and Yarrick stared back. The old man had expected a face distorted by hundreds of year's exposure to Chaos. This was the far opposite. Kharn's skin was pale, his eyes piercing black and his hair was red and long, shoulder length and unruly because of the lack of care. On his left cheek a black skull-rune of Khorne was tattooed. The skeletal structure of his face looked a bit like McKenzie's; same powerful jaw and high cheekbones. 

 "Bad move, Yarrick!" Kharn hissed. "Prepare to feel the wrath of the man that killed your grandfather!!" 

 Now firstly, Sebastian realized his mistake. He now knew what had been whispering in his mind; Deamon! The word came to him like a shock. He'd listened to a deamon, and thus used up his power. All he could do know was pray that he could evade the huge Marine. He couldn't...

 Kharn threw himself at the impudent commissar. No one in two hundred years had dared pull his helmet off and show his features to the world. Kharn had removed it when he was alone, not otherwise. He smiled savagely as his axe bit deeply into Yarrick's battle claw. An electric shock rippled through Sebastian's old body as the claw was short-circuited. Kharn pulled out the axe and gave the claw two, three more beats with his mighty axe. The old commissar sagged down to his knees, overcome by fatigue. This left Kharn with time to pick up his helmet and put it on and walk back to the fallen commissar. He bent down, looked curiously at the cord running from Sebastian's left temple and the pulled it out with a powerful jerk. This sent a new surge of electric energy through Sebastian's body. But he was too tired to scream. The adrenaline had left his body and his body right now felt like a dried up husk. 

 Kharn grabbed Sebastian firmly around the neck and hoisted the old man up into the air. Sebastian was held in a choke, he could feel Kharn's fingers close tighter around his frail, old neck. 

 "I said earlier I wouldn't kill you Yarrick. Well, I've just had a change of mind!" Kharn hissed. His left arm was unarmoured, and it was with that he held Sebastian, but the old man couldn't hurt him now. He moved the old man closer to the edge of the roof, and over it. Sebastian was now dangling with his feet three hundred metres above the ground, or the level closest to him. 

 "Make one move Kharn and I'll blow your frekking head off!" Charleston said as he aimed his plasma pistol at the renegade's head. 

 "Oh, Charleston, put the pea-shooter away, I've already predicted this." Kharn said, a slight tone of boredom in his voice. "I'll give you an ultimatum, as you're in no condition to bargain: Let me go and I'll spare Yarrick's neck here. Or you could follow and fight me, but the commissar would end up as a greasy stain on the lower level. 'S your choice!" 

 Before Charleston could answer, Kharn dropped Sebastian and that old man fell down. Shouting a colourful and evocative curse in the genre of his Grand Commander, Charleston dived after Sebastian with jump-pack at full blast. He knew Kharn would be gone when he came back up, but he had no choice! 

 After four seconds of free fall, Charleston caught the old man and sped upwards. Of what he could tell, Sebastian had taken a bit of a beating. As Charleston landed, he looked around. Kharn was gone without a trace, as usual. 

 "Damn you Kharn!" Charleston thought darkly to himself. "You've cost me a friend, an aide and nearly my life! One day, you'll have to pay back, and that with high interest rate." 

 The big Marine looked at the small, aged commissar cradled in his arms, mercifully embraced by the arms of unconsciousness. Now he realized his own fatigue. Picking up Sebastian's peaked cap and putting it on the man's head, Charleston walked down to the entrance hall of the opera house, or what was left of it. The remaining Steel Legion would wait for him down there, he knew. 

 As he got down to the entry hall, he noticed Ghazghkull's body gone. Charleston cursed once again. He thought he'd killed the Ork. He'd ask Seb why this was with Orks, but that was later. All the Lieutenant Commander Edmund Charleston now needed was sleep, well deserved sleep. He would report the mission as successful, but even if it was victory he didn't like it. This would be a victory indeed, but a hollow one...  

Equatorial Jungle, six months later, Armageddon liberated

"I tell you Eddie, there has been no recoverings of Berzerker corpses!" McKenzie said, as he and his companions looked out at what seemed like a huge field, and in the middle a totem pole. "This confirms my theories of that Kharn has dabbled with Necromancy!" 

 McGranth turned to his friend and gave him a stern look. He was more worried about the five hundred metres tall obelisk in the middle of the Equatorial Jungle, than of McKenzie's idea of zombie-Marines. "You've spent too much time in that Library, y'know! Even Ed here wouldn't come with such a ridiculous idea." 

 "Still," Sebastian shot in, scratching his head, "You can't deny the fact that there has been no reports of bodies from Berzerkers whatsoever. Only Orks. And that, my friend, scares me!" 

 "Eddie, we know that Magus Grimjaw is helping out Kharn," Charleston said, lowering the magnoculars he'd been looking through. The big obelisk out in the field gave him the creeps. "And he's a master-mind on gene-splicing, so why not Necromancy? I mean, he's psyker." 

 "Not as powerful and trained as me!" McKenzie exclaimed. 

 "No, but he has the Hive Mind to back him up, doesn't he?" Charleston said with a sly look. A low "True..." was McKenzie's reply. 

 "My dear brothers," McGranth tried break the smaller fight up. "Let's focus on the problem at hand, shall we?" 

 The others nodded in reply. McGranth looked pleased and turned his bulky frame towards the field again. His Terminator armour had behaved oddly lately, but he guessed it was because of the new left leg he'd gotten a few years earlier. The obelisk bothered him. No man, and that included Space Marines, could get any closer than a kilometre to that thing, without being engrossed in what McKenzie so colourfully called it; a Berzerker's Bloodlust. They would have to destroy it from afar, with plasma bombs. Problem was that there was no chance of getting a Basilisk mobile gun battery able to fire plasma grenades. The things would have to be dropped from orbit, but that meant that the jungle could get damaged, and according to Sebastian, damaging the Jungle was taboo. It was what made Armageddon hospitable. Silently, he pulled off a long, and very harsh line of curses. 

 "The taint must be exterminated, Grand Commander!" McKenzie suddenly said at his side. 

 "Words brother, but how?" McGranth snapped back. If McKenzie had better ideas of how to do it, he was welcome to tell. 

 "Long range shelling with ordinary explosives, has that ever entered your mind?" 

 "It has but Sebastian said there was no way that would harm it, if he knew Kharn rightly..." McGranth fell silent. "Speaking of which, where is the fella? And where's Ed?" 

 "I have no idea Eddie, they were here a minute ago!" McKenzie said and looked around. He made a sweep of the surroundings to feel where they were. "Eddie, they're walking towards that pyramid we discovered not far away from here." 

 "Oh, then don't mind. Whatever can that do for harm?" McGranth realized that cliché in his sentence too late. "Oh no, I didn't say that did I?" 

 "Famous last words..." McKenzie replied. "But don't bother, we can only do it worse, if my predictions are right." 

 "Will you stop looking into the future and focus at the present, Edward?" Eddie snapped and made a gesture towards the monolith. 

 Sebastian found Charleston walking around the foot of the huge, black pyramid. He seemed to looking for something. If it was the entrance, Seb hoped Ed wouldn't find one. The old commissar hoped he could relax when he saw that the walls seemed to be made of solid stone. 

 "Ed, tell me, why are you so interested in this thing?" Sebastian asked and walked up to the Marine. 

 "It holds a secret, I know it. And I don't need to be psyker for that!" Charleston said and pressed at a place on the solid wall at random. Nothing. 

 "Well, your instincts are telling you wrong..." Sebastian said and leaned against the wall with his left arm. The wall went in slightly and behind Seb a huge hole opened itself. The two men looked at it stunned for a second, before Charleston took command and went inside. Sebastian hurried after. The huge shutter-door closed with a bang behind them. 

 "Y'know Ed, this just isn't happening. This pyramid has stood here for five millennia, without anyone finding out how to get inside." Sebastian said in the pitch-darkness. "Gee, what are the odds?" Charleston said and clapped his hands together for emphasis. Torches along the wall of the corridor they were in lit up. But the flames weren't natural. They threw a blue, synthetic light instead of the warm, orange of usual flames. The torches weren't alone on the walls. Strange hieroglyphs lined them as well. 

 "How come there are Droids on them? And what are those things with crests?" Charleston asked, as he looked one wall. He turned on the lights in his battle suit, cause the torches in some way scared him. 

 "I have no idea..." Sebastian's voice trailed off. Something on the floor had catched his eye. "Ed, the dust has been recently moved. We're not alone in this great big pyramid. Auspex on!" 

 Charleston did as he was told and pulled out the life-sign/motion tracker combine tool. He turned it on and the two antennas at the top of it extended themselves and the machine went online. The screen lit up with a greenish light and the buttons on it, for magnifying and various other things, lit up as well. With a low 'dut-dut-dut' the auspex scanned the nearest 100 metres. Then he put the auspex on the back of his lower left arm, as his lights were mounted on the back of the lower right arm, and this also left his hands free for his weapons. Sebastian used his bionic eye for seeing; he didn't need any flashlight. The heat and night vision in his eye did their job well. The only thing was that the darkness for his natural eye made it a bit strange in seeing one eye and not the other. 

 Sebastian took the lead now. This smelled fishy to him. Fugu-fishy! He had left his storm bolter at the camp, but his laspistol was still at his side, and he held it high in his left hand. His right hand was no more, and he stubbornly refused to use McKenzie's implant. He only used it when he absolutely had to, not other ways. Right now, his lower right arm was the hefty battle-claw he'd taken as a trophy from Ugulhard. He went round a corner and scanned the room with both bionic eye and laspistol. This room wasn't lit up as the last one. The heat scanner took the room on the sweep to the right and the night vision on the back sweep to the left. Nothing. The room was empty, except for the entrance on the far side of it. It was maybe a good two hundred metres away from them. The walls were clean. Too clean for Yarrick's taste. He took up the scrap of metal he'd had inside of his coat since the whole darned war began, and threw it into the room. It hit something invisible and was incinerated in a flash. Sebastian smiled to himself. A nice trap indeed. 

 "Ed, put on your helmet and switch the infra-reds on. Laser." Sebastian said curtly and switched mode in his bionic eye. Now he saw the crosshatch of laser beams, each one capable of crippling a foot and sending him crashing down on the floor, thus being perforated by a dozen other laser shots. 

 "Tricky," Charleston said, his voice distorted by the helmet. "Hey, Seb, your coat is quite long. I'll carry you over." Before Sebastian could protest, Charleston had lifted him up in his arms and was carrying him over the laser-trap. Charleston missed a few times and got a blast at his feet, but his ceramite steel uniform protected him. As he reached the other end of the room, he put Sebastian safely down. Unwittingly, Sebastian gave Ed a "Thank you." as he looked at the floor. The prints in the dust were still here. Whoever had passed the trap, knew the trap had been there, all right. 

 "Let's keep on moving Ed." Sebastian said and walked into the doorway... 

 ...And stepped into a vast chamber, lined by huge marble pillars. He guessed the roof had to be at least a hundred meters above him. The strange torches also lighted up this chamber. He made a scan of the room, but found naught. He stepped into the chamber and looked around, awed by the sheer enormity of the place. Each and every pillar was marked with the same strange hieroglyphs as the walls from the first corridor. Seb turned round to Charleston. "Any readings?" 

 "Nothing." Charleston replied, taking a look at the auspex. He flicked it over to motion tracker. "Still nothing." Charleston pulled of the helmet. 

 "What exactly are we looking for Seb?" 

 "I don't know. You wanted to go inside." Sebastian snapped back. 

 "Yeah, I did, but how do you know where to go to?" 

 "The prints in the dust, of course. And we'll follow them till this creeping feeling of mine goes away." 

 Charleston gave a shrug and the twosome covered the room sprinting. The lieutenant commander threw regular glances at his auspex, but the only thing that stirred was he and Sebastian. 

 The next room was a crossroad. The way split up in five new corridors from here. They spread out like a star around them. Sebastian once again looked down onto the floor. Charleston followed his eyes and saw the steps in the dust still were here. They went to the northwest corridor. Without a word between themselves, Charleston and Yarrick walked towards that corridor. Here, the torches were also already lit. They walked through the corridor and got into a new room, unlit. Sebastian looked around with his night vision while Charleston made a scan with the motion tracker. Sebastian saw the big Marine shake his head in disbelief. He also heard the click from behind. Ears trained by years of fighting in the Imperial Guard had taught him what the safety-lock of a bolt pistol sounded like. Yarrick spun round, coat flying out around his waist as a ballerina's dress when doing a pirouette, but Sebastian's reason was not aesthetic. The bionic eye flashed and so did his laspistol, which he'd aimed at the only thing in the darkness that didn't show up on his heat vision. The bionic eye's shot, however, hit flesh, and a man's scream was heard. There also was a clatter from when the bolt pistol hit the ground. Luckily though, the shot didn't go off. It took Sebastian half a second to be upon the man. He struck once, twice at him with his good hand. The human seemed to have gone unconscious by the second blow and Sebastian stopped. He felt the sticky blood coming out from the man's right triceps. Now Charleston was beside him. The big Marine aimed his flashlight at the face of the attacker. 

 "By the Throne, Seb!" Charleston gasped. 

 "I know," Sebastian replied calmly. "Herman von Strab, in person." 

 Von Strab slowly opened his eyes. He could remember a flash, no two flashes of light, almost simultaneously, and he remembered that he'd felt a pain in his right arm. The pain was still there, throbbing. Von Strab grunted as he pulled himself upright into a sitting position. 

 "As the ex-lord governor is now awake, I believe we can go on with our trial," a slightly strident, tenor voice said close to him. Herman knew the voice. And he wasn't happy to hear it. Although he'd been on the run for months now without meeting a living man, though a whole lot of dead ones, he knew what awaited him if he got caught. The Imperium of Mankind would consider his acts as high treason, and the man before him would consider it a matter of honour. The latter was far worse. Sebastian Yarrick, Imperial Commissar and veteran of many wars, held honour over anything, von Strab knew full well, and he had dishonoured Yarrick somewhat gravely. The old man wouldn't take him before a war criminal tribunal; Yarrick would carry out the sentence summarily. 

 "Herman von Strab, you are charged for high treason, bribery, murder and genocide." Sebastian began and aimed a flashlight into the face of von Strab, making the powerful man wince slightly. Herman was still powerful, though the months out in the free had made him a bit famined. 

 "Bribery?" Herman asked. 

 "Of Commissar Holt, who else?" Sebastian replied softly. 

 "He blackmailed me! He said that if I didn't pay him a certain amount of money each month, he'd tell the Imperium's leaders that..." Herman suddenly fell silent. 

 "Oh, what a tangled web we weave," Sebastian said mockingly. "I already know why he blackmailed you, Herman. That's why I have murder on the list of accusations."  

 "I see..." 

 "Now, the others might need some explanation; you ignored my warnings, frekk, you even ignored the warnings made by the Emperor himself! Treason, not only towards the Imperium, but also towards the people you are meant to protect! Which leads to the accusation of genocide; many billions of civilians and soldiers have died because of you! We've had a Titan Legion wiped out and half a Space Marine company wiped out because of you! And it doesn't stop there; the final accusation, murder!" Sebastian got a dark look on his face now, as if the last hadn't been enough. 

 "You murdered your father and brothers, just so you could seize power over Armageddon. Only two creatures come to mind that can do something as underhanded as that: Humans and Deamons. Are you a heretic, Herman von Strab, or just a traitor?" 

 "Just go on with it old man!" Herman spat at Yarrick. If he was going to die, he didn't want it prolonged. 

 No one of the two men paid attention to Ed any more. He wandered off to the far end of the chamber. There was something horrid with this place. Inhuman, alien in all its ways. The hieroglyphs, the traps. No human was supposed to be able to get through those. For that you'd to have a skin of metal. Charleston stopped. He looked around and was startled at the many alcoves around here, built into the walls. Each alcove was the resting place of a man-sized robot. They made no sign, their mechanical eyes dead. Some of them had cobwebs on them. None were rusty, none were without a weapon. They all held in strangely designed guns, an emerald crystal seeming to be the emitter of whatever unholy beam the weapons fired. 'Cause they seemed to be beam-weapons, most likely. Charleston let his wrist-mounted flashlights travel over the inanimate metal warriors. He noticed some were more heavily built than the others and carried bigger guns. After a few minutes, his ray of light fell upon a robot that didn't carry a gun. Instead, it held in a nearly three metres tall staff, lavishly decorated with gold and platinum, finished off at the top by a ruby. The leader robot, because it obviously was a leader robot, also wore a headdress, made out of gold, strange symbols etched into its ancient surface. As Ed walked closer to have a better look at the leader robot, he aimed his flashlight at the ruby set into the robot's forehead. A high-pitched whine was heard from inside of the mechanical thing and it threw open it's eyes. A green, inhuman light came from the eyes. 

 Charleston started backwards as the thing stepped out of its alcove. Ed looked worriedly over his shoulder as he heard the same whining sound from around him as the other droids went online. Twenty pairs of green, robotic eyes glared at him from the darkness, the light from their neighbour highlighting their metal hides. Charleston looked back at the leader. 

 "We are the Necrontyr." it said in a distorted voice. It had no moving jaw or vocal cords, so it had to be synthetic, Ed guessed. "We were created by the C'tan to inherit this world when our time came. Thou has risen us, thou shall feel the wrath of C'tan!" 

 Acting on instinct, Ed raised his plasma pistol and blew the head of the leader robot. The thing toppled and fell to the ground with a metallic thud. Turning, Charleston saw that the other Necrons were raising their guns, power crystals glowing. He also heard a strange sound. It was a low, shuffling, scraping sound, like the sound made of hundreds of centipedes or beetles. Throwing a quick glance upwards, Charleston stared at what seemed like hundreds of green eyes. Not wanting to stay to find out what the things up in the roof were, Charleston ran back towards Sebastian and Herman. 

 Behind him, four, five, six of the little, insecticide droids fell down from the roof and scuttled after on their mechanical insect's legs. After them came more of the beetles and the Necron warriors moved out of their alcoves and marched after the running Charleston. 

 Sebastian raised his laspistol and put the muzzle to Herman's forehead. "And thus, as the Emperor dictates, I condemn you to..." His voice trailed off. Sebastian heard a heavy, but even thumping behind him. He hadn't turned but saw Herman's surprised gaze as the ex-governor looked over his shoulder. Then they heard Charleston's deep voice shout. 

 "The robots are coming, the robots are coming!" For being a two metres fifty tall man, Charleston was incredibly fast. He ran past the commissar and the Armageddon noble with an almost impossible speed for his bulk. What whooshed past the two men was a red blur it appeared. 

 "What the frekk did the Marine mean with that?" von Strab asked with a puzzled look on his face. Sebastian, having forgotten about the summary execution, saw what Ed had meant. The hundreds of green eyes that glared out of the dark. Inhuman, unfeeling and utterly mechanical. Robots! 

 "I suggest we make a run for it as well, von Strab. Ed meant those!" Sebastian said, indicating the eyes with his one good hand. Seconds later, von Strab and Yarrick were running as well, and indeed catching in on Charleston. The Marine was handicapped by his armour, but neither von Strab nor Yarrick were. Sebastian maybe because of his age, but that hadn't occurred to him, it seemed. He ran nimbly past Charleston and took the lead. This made Charleston a bit confounded. 

 "I thought commissars led from the front?" he asked. 

 Sebastian shot the big Marine a quick glance and then replied: "I am leading from the front right now, am I not?" 

 "Yeah but I thought..." A crackling beam of energy that whipped past him cut off Charleston. Apparently, the robots had gotten within firing range. This was not good. 

 "ED! We can't get past the laser-room!" Sebastian came to a hideous conclusion. He'd forgotten all about it. That was not good. 

 "I know another way!" von Strab shouted suddenly. He was running alongside Charleston, no trouble in keeping up with the other two. It startled Seb that Herman wanted to help, despite what Sebastian had been about to do with him. 

 "Then show us, Herman von Strab!" Sebastian shouted. More shots were hissing towards them, but at the great range, they went wide. They were now back in the big chamber with the huge marble pillars. But, instead of running out the way they'd come from, Herman took to the right and ran behind one of the pillars. Yarrick and Charleston followed. The ex-governor pressed something on the wall and a secret door swung open. As they got inside, Herman closed the door behind them. 

 "You owe me one now, Commissar Yarrick." the bulky man panted forth and gave the commissar a sly look. 

 "Believe I do..." Sebastian mumbled quietly to himself. Now he understood how Holt had succumbed. Herman might not be a genius in tactics, but he possessed a low cunning that would make a deamon jealous, Sebastian concluded. He looked around the room they now were in. It looked odd, the far end of the chamber was round, as if it was supposed to let through something very big and round. He looked behind him and saw that the corridor they'd come out from was just a hole between two ramps. All was made out of stone blocks, and covered in hieroglyphs. He threw a new look towards the far end of the chamber. His augmented vision on his left eye zoomed in a bit and what he'd thought was confirmed. The long, tubular chamber ended in daylight, and an exit that was opening. He made a gesture for the others to follow. 

 "Let's get out of here, don't you agree?" he said and walked out of the corridor between the ramps. Charleston and von Strab followed. As they walked, Sebastian heard a tiny click. Instinctively, he looked down at his boots. He removed his left foot from were he'd put it down. The tiny button he'd pressed down with his weight, clicked up again, and a huge rumbling noise was heard. The threesome turned to see a massive stone ball coming loose from its holdings up in the roof far above them and start rolling towards them with constantly accelerating speed. Seb judged the thing to weigh at least a couple of tonnes. He was so shocked by the huge thing, that he didn't even hear himself scream to the others to run. 

 Sebastian Yarrick realized this time that he was an old man, and couldn't run as fast as Charleston and von Strab. His knees gave away and he fell to the ground. Shocked, he looked at the onrushing stone ball. It was going to crush his old body. Turn it into watery mush. He closed his single eye... 

 Sebastian suddenly got the feeling of flying. Opening his eye, he saw that he was once again in the comfort of Charleston's powerful arms. The Space Marine had turned round and, unbelievably deftly, flown with his jump pack and caught Sebastian from the ground seconds before he would've been crushed. Now they were rushing ahead of the stone with an incredible speed. Sebastian saw von Strab running before them and held out his battle-claw. He could catch von Strab with it, without cutting the man in half, he hoped. After all, it was so deadly because of the pneumatics, not the sharp edges of the blades. Two seconds later, Sebastian had caught Herman around the waist and told Ed to give all he got. Slowly, Sebastian closed the claw blades around von Strab so he wouldn't fall out of his grip. Seb also urged back the feeling of wanting to close the claw blades entirely. He felt the punch from the thrusters of the jump pack as Ed put it on full blast. Too long on this gear, and the reactor overheated, Seb knew it full well. But Charleston would have to have it in that gear till they were clear of the stone. 'Not much further now,' Seb thought. 'Hang in there Ed, you can do it!' 

 With the ear-splitting sound of the molested engines of the jump pack coming to him finally, the bundle of men flew out of the hole in the wall of the pyramid. Sebastian sighed in relief as he saw the stone ball get stuck in the hole, which was too narrow for it. Sebastian heard Ed sigh as well. The stress he'd put on the engines could have killed him. But it hadn't. Charleston settled down and was immediately surrounded by troops; Guardsmen as well as Marines. Charleston let go of Seb, but Sebastian didn't let go of Herman. The man struggled of course. 

 "You owe me one, Yarrick!" Herman hissed at the old man. Sebastian looked softly back at the man in his pneumatic grip. 

 "I beg to differ, my dear gentleman. By catching you and saving your arse in there," Sebastian gestured at the pyramid. "I made us even. We're quits. Just you be happy that a war criminal tribune will take car of you now." Sebastian looked around and raised his voice: 

 "Commissar McLaren!!" A tall, wiry man in his thirties came running towards them, dressed in the black uniform of the Imperial Commissariat. He saluted Yarrick. When he saw von Strab, he was about to spit on him, but the older commissar stopped him. 

 "There will be plenty of time for that later, my comrade," Sebastian said and let go of von Strab. As if on cue, the unlocking click of security locks of a dozen bolters and lasguns was heard. Von Strab finally gave up and held up his arms in the air. He was led away by a squad of Guardsmen. Before McLaren disappeared with the Guard, Sebastian grabbed the young man by the arm. 

 "Make sure he gets the punishment he deserves," Sebastian said to the tall man. 

 "Of course, Commissar Yarrick." McLaren replied and smiled savagely. 

 "He's a war criminal..." Sebastian said thoughtfully. He dismissed the thought he'd had been concerning. "Life okay with you otherwise, John?" 

 "Yes sir! It was an honour to be trained by a man such as you. You're a living legend now. The Saviour of Hades Hive." McLaren replied happily. 

 "That warmed an old man's heart, boy. Now, take care of the ex-governor." 

 Sebastian looked at young man as he ran after the Guardsmen watching von Strab. McLaren had been one of Sebastian's best cadets that he'd trained over the years. Though, since McLaren, Sebastian hadn't trained any more cadets. Sebastian had been sixty-four when McLaren was fully fledged as a commissar, and the Commissariat had considered him too old for such any more. 

 "What a rush!" Charleston said at his side, suddenly. Sebastian looked up at the man. 

 "Indeed. Ed, concern this war now officially over!" Sebastian said with a sweeping gesture. 

 "Not quite." a voice said behind them. They turned and saw McKenzie standing there, arms crossed over his chest. "How the frekk do we deal with that monolith, commissar?" 

 "You haven't thought up a way in all these many hours?" Sebastian asked surprised and raised an eyebrow. 

 "No, cause I've been worried sick because of you two." 

 "McKenzie, stop complaining. You sound as if you were my mother." 

 "How should you know how a mother sounds?" McKenzie said caustically, without thinking on what he was doing. 

 Charleston stopped Sebastian from ramming his battle-claw into McKenzie's chest and gave his fellow Marine a dark look. They both knew how a sensitive subject Sebastian's family was. McKenzie, agitated, as he'd become, had used it as a provocative against Sebastian, and it had worked. 

 "Edward is right," McGranth said as he approached, Terminator armour humming. "We still haven't figured out a way to get rid of the monolith." 

 "Well, at least we know why it took the Dark One such time to reach Armageddon Secondus." Sebastian said with a shrug. "He was constructing this, and gives us another conclusion." The others looked quizzically on the old man. "No Berzerker could have erected that; Khorne shuns the use of psychic witchery, excuse me Edward, so he must have had the use of psykers. There's no other explanation to it all." 

 The Marines looked at each other. It made sense, it frekking made sense! Sebastian's knack of seeing order in chaos had helped yet again. 

 "So what do we do with the monolith then?" McGranth asked cautiously. 

 "Nuke it." Sebastian said simply. "The pyramid is a nest of alien creatures as well. That's the only way." He looked at the huge black pyramid towering behind McGranth's shoulder. 

 "There were robots in it." Charleston shot in. "They said they'd been created by the C'tan and that they were going to inherit this world. I don't like it..." 

 "But what about the forest, the jungle? It will be made inhospitable by the atomics!" McKenzie protested. "There must be some other way! And the robots then? They might hold the answer to why even the Emperor was created! C'tan is a by-word for Paladin in the ancient tongues!" 

 "That might well be McKenzie, but they were in no way friendly." Sebastian said and looked the wiry Marine in the eye. "But yes, we can use something else than atomics." 

 "What might that be? It's the most powerful weapon known to mankind." McGranth queried. 

 "Ever heard of anti-matter?" Sebastian asked softly. "I heard recently that the Adeptus Mechanicus has developed a way of using anti-matter as a bomb. Not much is needed, and it leaves no radiation of what I know." 

 "How come I haven't found out about it?" McKenzie looked stumped. 

 "In a way, it makes planetary assaults by Space Marine obsolete. You're still needed of course, but when an 'unimportant' planet is taken, we can send in a fleet armed with anti-matter bombs instead of a Space Marine Legion. Armageddon is such an important planet, that anti-matter bombing was out of the question. That's why you were summoned, mainly." 

 "How did you know then Seb?" McKenzie asked curiously. 

 "A Mechanicus adept told me so when I got my battle-claw repaired after the meeting with Kharn. Didn't think of it until now...though." 

 "You're incredible Seb..." McKenzie murmured silently to himself. He turned to the others: "As said, the taint must be exterminated!" With that, he strode off. 

 "McGranth," Sebastian asked. "Have you ever heard of the Codex: Terra?" 

 "Yeah. It's that book about that planet far away which was left monitored but not controlled by the Emperor, right?" 

 "Sort of. Have you read it?" 

 "McKenzie has." McGranth thumbed towards his comrade who was now talking with some men clad in the dark red robes of the Adeptus Mechanicus. Charleston had disappeared, probably to tend his poor jump pack. McGranth waited till McKenzie had finished talking with the adepts and whistled him to come over. 

 "What is it, Commander?" he asked as he came over. 

 "The commissar wants to ask you something." With that, McGranth left McKenzie and Yarrick alone. 

 "Edward, you've read the Codex: Terra, right?" 

 "Many times, Sebastian, many times. I find it...entrancing." 

 "Right, have you read that appendix named the Bible?" 

 "Yes...I think so, though it's claiming to be the Book of Books, which is in my eyes heretical." 

 "Mine too. Now, I've conducted some simple maths, and I find it highly peculiar that this here war lasted for exactly 666 days, counting this as the last day." An uneasy silence followed Sebastian's words. 

 "You can't be serious Sebastian..." McKenzie mumbled. Sebastian just gave him a look that said he was serious. "I mean, the number of the Beast?" 

 "You've read the Book of Revelations at least." Sebastian chuckled. 

 "I find its prophecies intriguing." Another pause of silence. "That means that, the Book of Revelations meant here, not the Project!" 

 "Exactly!" Sebastian exclaimed. "I quote: 'And they gathered in the place named in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon.' End quote." 

 "It's a strange world we live in..." 

 "Yes it is my friend, yes it is..." 

Volcanus Hive, nearly two years after the Space Hulk landed and started the Battle for Armageddon 

 Sebastian was standing in the plaza were the statue of his grandfather stood. It had incredibly enough managed unscathed through the war. The tall Callidussian Commissar General still stood in his victorious pose, sword raised high, pointing towards the north and the ruins of the Tower of Doom. At the foot of the statue the cracked helmets of Berzerkers lay stacked. Despite the hundreds of years it had stood here, it wasn't eroded. The features of the famous hero were still as clear as the day the statue had been erected. Sebastian knew he had his grandfather's high-cheeked face and the green eyes. Sebastian walked closer to the huge marble statue, Cerberus following at his heels. The last time the big wolfhound had been here, his master had been young, and so had he. Now both he and his master were old. Cerberus remembered what had happened last time. It hadn't been funny. Now, however, his master had confidence in his steps. He'd just won a war. 

 Sebastian stopped a metre from the statue and looked up at the face of his grandfather. It took a while for the words to form for Sebastian, but after a minute, he started to talk with the statue. 

 "Y'know gramps, I've always been feeling inferior to you. You were the great war-hero. My father had also given his life in the Emperor's service, so had my uncle. I had so much to live up to. I really wanted to prove myself. Things sort of went out of hand when I was fifteen, didn't they? I mean, it wasn't so that I was afraid of the Chaos beasts; I just had this horrible premotion. McKenzie has thought it's psychic. I don't. You had that knack too didn't you? To be able to see order in chaos? But not that day. 

 "I've cursed myself ever since. I kicked myself through the Schola Progenum, IG helping me to keep going. Now he's also gone. Just like you. He was all I could ask for, and more. Then I have Cerberus, the puppy that was a gift. A faithful companion indeed, but he's old, just as me. You were different there, weren't you, gramps? You didn't age as normal men. Okay, you were grey-haired, but not old, in the word's true meaning. Hell, you even had a nickname. I mean, you weren't only regarded as any Commissar General. People considered you an incarnation of the Wolf, Hrodwulf Léman, didn't they? But to the entire of the Imperium, you were known as the Liberator of Armageddon. 

 "Now, I've also made me a nickname. Grandfather, I am your grandson; Sebastian Yarrick, Imperial Commissar and Saviour of Hades Hive!" 

 With that, Sebastian closed his eyes and smiled. He'd made peace with his past ghosts at last... 

Earth, present time. McKenzie and Charleston talking in the bar 

 "And that, brother, is the story of the Battle for Armageddon." Charleston said as he ended the story. He looked at McKenzie at his right. 

 "Good to know what happened." McKenzie said and returned to his beer. There was a long pause of silence. 

 "Edd, what was the Project: Terra actually?" Charleston said after a moment. 

 "What it was? It was a test in seeing if humanity could make do without the influence of the Emperor. If it worked, the Imperium would have been able to expand throughout the entire galaxy. Sadly though, the coming of Deamon Lord Juijaeg interrupted the project, the 12th deamon lord. He also caused the Great Merge between the two legions of which ours were formed." McKenzie had been on the verge of saying 'is', but reminded himself of the destruction of the Imperium and his beloved legion. 

 "And after that, there was no time for such an experiment again. But we do know that Terra, or Earth has managed fine." 

 "Urth?" Charleston asked confounded. 

 "Earth, Ed. E-a-r-t-h. Earth. That's what native humans call it." 

 "What about the Codex: Terra?" Charleston asked. 

 "It's actually a twenty volumes collection of books containing material from 10.000 BC to 1200 AD, Terra standard time. But, I believe the Imperium in some way knew of Juijeag's coming. See, they stored away information about travelling the stars here on Terra." McKenzie's voice dropped to a whisper. "See, when humanity here is ready, they'll find the information on how to make contact with the Imperium again." 

 "How? Do tell." 

 "STC's. Standard Template Constructs. They contain all the data needed to create what the humans of Terra need to travel the stars." 

 "Do you know where they are?" Charleston asked and looked concerned. 

 "Yes, I do in fact." McKenzie took a look around to see if no one was listening on them. "There are four in this system, named Sol 1 by these humans; one on Terra itself, in a pyramid called the Cheops pyramid. It contains data for how to terraform a planet to make it habitable. One on the moon of this planet, which tells how to build a warp-engine. It on the far side of it, so it's secure for now. There are two on Mars; one for how to build one of the Galaxy class cruisers. Y'know, the big ones. The other is how to make a Warlord Titan." 

 "Okay." Charleston didn't know that McKenzie had left out two things for him. That Saturn's moon Triton held the STC's on how to alter the genes of a human to make him Space Marine. All info for Space Marine creation was on Triton; gene coding, implants, armour and even the trusty bolt guns used by the Adeptus Astartes. It was best to keep that away from him. 

 McKenzie got up and walked towards the door. The bartender stopped him. 

 "Buddy, you haven't paid!" the bartender, a stocky man in his forties called him from the counter. He received Ed's money as he talked. 

 "I've already paid." McKenzie said and made a lithe move with his right hand. 

 "Never mind," the bartender said suddenly. "Forgot you've already had paid." 

 As Charleston joined McKenzie he gave his friend a very dark look indeed. 

 "Got that from a movie." McKenzie simply replied. Charleston decided not to argue. 

 "Hey Edward, do you think there are Yarricks in Terra?" 

 "What makes you think that?" 

 "Well, Terra was probably uninhabited when man came here, wasn't it?" 

 "Yes, and it was populated with humans from the Imperial worlds." 

 "Thought so. That means there must be psykers here, and Yarricks." Charleston remembered the boy from the cul-de-sac that had been so much alike Rolf Yarrick. Even name ways. 

 "Could be, Ed, could be..." 

 The two Marines left the street were the bar lay. They didn't pay attention to the old man sitting by the window, talking with an old friend. The old man's hair was steely grey, with a shade of blue in it. Just like the Yarrick family's legacy. 

                                                                                                                    The ED!


	3. Disclaimer...

CREDITS for Number of the ED:   
  
This story is based upon an old board-game called Battle for Armageddon, released in the beginning of the 90s by Games Workshop. Several characters in this story are also taken screaming (;)) from the WH40K universe, these being Ghazghkull Thraka, Commissar Yarrick, Herman von Strab, Princeps Mannheim, Tu'shan, High Marshal Helbrecht and the entire planet of Armageddon.   
These are all © copyright of Games Workshop Ltd.   
On the other hand are Holt, Zebulon, Ishamel Grisham, Cerberus and Captain Mikos my own creations, along with a whole host of minor characters. The animals native to Armageddon, such as sand-cobras (with exception for gyrinxes) are also my own creation. These are in other words © Copyright of Maria Olsson.   
The Holy Bible has also proved much helpful and so has the history books I have.   
A big thanks to anyone who has stood out with the waiting of this story to conclude. Your truly good friends.   
  
Any comments on this story would be greatly appretiated, thank you. 


End file.
